Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments
by A Flying Fladoodle
Summary: Harry Potter may not be the Boy-Who-Lived, but he is many things. Sirius Black wants nothing to do with his family, but he will do whatever it takes to do his deceased friends justice. Follow the story of Harry Potter at the shoulder of unrepentant troublemaker and his godfather, Sirius Black. Ultimately Voldemort was vanquished, but merely a symptom and not the whole problem.
1. Fire Squad

A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.

A/N 2: I'm not ignorant to the fact Harry Potter takes place in Britain, so if any of you wonderful Brits see something and think ' _that's so American it's revolting_ ' shoot me a message or review or something.

A/N 3: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognise. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 1: Fire Squad

Samhain was a glorious day to be a Dark Lord, Lord Voldemort thought to himself as he appeared out of thin air at the end of a lane before a large house. The magic of Death present in the atmosphere enamoured him to the task at hand, though three murders were trivial in comparison to other things he'd done in years past on this date including creating his first Horcrux. This family had been a thorn in his side up until two years ago but since their son had been born had gone into hiding thanks to that ridiculous prophecy. If it hadn't been for the Snape boy bursting in on an Inner Circle meeting proclaiming that there was information of his downfall he would have dismissed it. Unfortunately, he thought Dumbledore had learned of his Horcruxes and had aggressively interrogated him right in front of his followers, so here he was proving that no one could cause his death. Especially two measly infants. Dumbledore had, intentionally, let it slip that the boy he was currently targeting was to be the more powerful of the two but he knew different. Even if Wormtail hadn't been a spy within the Order of the Phoenix one only had to compare the parents to know it had been a futile illusion. He was grudgingly worried about what the other boy could be in the future and truthfully did not want to put himself in a compromising situation which was why he had ordered five of his most loyal and powerful followers to attack the family this night as well, and hopefully, he would be washed of this situation.

As he approached the house he could see the family comfortably enjoying themselves in the living room through a large bay window listening to the wireless he assumed as they were dancing together, mother, father and son, probably listening to the broadcast there always was from the Ministry Ball. They were so carefree and he could not help but wonder how two families could make the same exact mistake with the Fidelius Charm in forming a ruse and trusting the wrong person with the secret of their location. Ah, Wormtail was actually proving quite useful these days. He would have had immense more difficulty if the Potters and Longbottoms had made Sirius Black and Kingsley Shacklebolt their Secret-Keepers, respectively. But they had both, unknowingly to the other, chosen _Wormtail_! HA! The best part was no one who wasn't involved knew either had engaged in the deception. Maybe he should eliminate the phonies when he was done here, tie up loose ends and all that to keep Wormtail's cover regardless of how pathetic he was. It was Samhain after all, a little more death wouldn't be amiss. With that thought, he unleashed a powerful blasting curse at the front door completely disintegrating it with a **BANG!**

The father turned and briefly made eye contact with him before yelling, "Go! Take our son and escape! I'll hold him off!"

Fools his enemies were, had to be to think there was hope, "Good Evening, Mr. Longbottom..."

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There was no way to describe how Sirius Black felt right now, sad, happy, angry, relaxed, lost, inspired and most of all, anxious. Honestly, he had no idea how he felt right now, just he had somewhere to be and hopefully by the time he got there he'd have sorted himself out. That was one of the good things travelling by flying motorcycle, other than being undisputedly awesome, it gave him time to sort through his thoughts like James always said he could on a broom. The death of the Longbottoms, who had been two years above him at school and Aurors as well as involved in the Order, was just the latest they'd had to deal with among their friends but every one lost was a burden without fail, and with Voldemort finally dead hopefully it would be the last. He didn't know what to think about the death of Britain's most feared Dark Lord in centuries at the hands of a fifteen month old kid. Though there had always been rumours that the Longbottoms were descended from the Gryffindors themselves and Alice was descended from a family of spellcrafters, with them being in hiding for over a year and a half now it wasn't unreasonable to think they had dug up some previously unknown old spell or ritual in a family book. Then there was Shacklebolt! Never had he thought there was a chance he would betray the secret of his friends hiding place, even two days ago when they had talked in the Auror Office he had seemed perfectly calm and collected. Finally, Peter was missing from his apartment which was making him anxious, but he hoped that news of the Dark Lord's defeat had reached him first and he had simply gone off to his mother's to let her know. It wouldn't be the first time Wormtail put spending time with his mum over friends.

Regardless he was off to James and Lily's house to let them know the news of their recently deceased friends and national Dark Lord, maybe he would be able to figure things out from there on how to proceed for the next foreseeable future. He knew Albus Dumbledore was off dealing with the elder and youngest Longbottoms, and there had been a call from the Ministry for all Aurors and Hit-Wizards to be on hand in case there was a chance to apprehend any Death Eaters in the fallout from the night's developments. While he was all for catching the bastards, it was a Saturday night and he wanted to spend time with his closest friends, considered them family really considering how he detested his immediate blood relatives. The only exception being Andromeda, a wonderful albeit stubborn woman and middle sibling of his cousins. The woman had disavowed the family in order to marry a muggleborn wizard, although unlike himself she had been disowned permanently by Orion Black, Sirius' father. Sirius himself had simply been relieved of his ' _duties_ ' of being heir to The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, though now that he thought about it, he was not very certain where he sat; with the remaining males in the family, his father and younger brother, Regulus, having died in the course of the Blood War. Hopefully he'd be able to keep his distance. Hit-Wizarding business be damned, he wanted to spend time with his brother in all but blood, the woman who had quickly become a sister to him and their precious son who was his godson.

At the outskirts of Godric's Hollow he maneuvered the large motorcycle onto a road to drive through the village like a muggle. Once Lily had taught him the rules of the road it had made plenty of sense to turn off the enchantments on the bike once he landed so there weren't any muggles seeing a motorbike seemingly appear out of thin air once he arrived at his destination and turned it off. The mix of muggle repelling, extrasensory, invisibility, heightened comfortability, stability and most importantly flying enchantments were quite a brilliant work of magic, it could get him a Mastery in the subject of Charms if it wasn't totally utterly illegal, not to mention that there wasn't much desire to put in all the extra studying for required testing, that's what school was for! Maybe once the war was cleaned up he'd get around to doing it, without a doubt his deceased fiancée Marlene would have wanted him to. Even if she was gone now he was still using his old excuses to explain his behaviour to her memory. Further, it would take his mind off the pain and depression that his life had been immersed in for three months now. Yeah that seemed like a good idea he thought, as he turned the last corner before the Potter's cottage, he could even get Lily's notes from when she got her Mastery.

Suddenly he heard spellfire mixed with an explosion. Shite, shite, shite was the only thing going through Sirius' mind and he spurned the bike on at full speed, as he saw indeed that there was a fight going on throughout his friend's property. He didn't even stop to get off the motorbike: when he tried to apparate off and directly into the yard but was unsuccessful due to wards he slowed as little as needed and jumped off into a well executed roll that had been standard taught in Hit-Wizard Academy, although for a broom instead of muggle machine. At a full sprint he ran to the gate in front of the cottage, noticed it was destroyed as he went through it and immediately tried to assess the situation. There was a body on the ground on the left side of the path to the front door, it was large and bulky though so was neither James nor Lily thankfully, a wide gash across the chest and was surrounded by blood. It seemed that as a direct frontal assault hadn't worked the attackers had gone around back or spread out because the spellfire was coming from that direction and the side to his left. As he approached the body maneuvering around transfigurations and debris to see who it was he noticed the typical silver Death Eater mask and cursed the damned Dark Lord Voldemort, but upon removing it his blood ran cold. It was Rabastan Lestrange which meant his horrid and ruthless cousin Bellatrix Lestrange, who was the most feared witch in Britain, Rabastan's sister-in-law and Andromeda's older sister, was most likely one of the attackers. Instantly, he decided to outflank the attackers and proceeded as stealthily as possible.

Upon reaching the side of the cottage he found someone guarding against exactly what he planned to do, immediately engaging him in a furious and intense duel. The style was recognisable though, clearly adopted from that of an Auror, thus making it predictable and Sirius knew he would be able to find an opening soon. At once several things happened; his opponent attempted to cast a powerful and long winded curse and took a split second too long, Sirius saw him get ready and quickly sent a nonverbal _expulso_ at his opponent's chest which audibly cracked a number of ribs and sent a spray of blood out from their chest, a mocking gleeful cackle sounded from the back of the cottage in triumph and a feminine shriek of horror rang through the night. Sirius knew what that probably meant, James had been hit, which only served to make him angrier and he rushed to the back of the cottage to exact revenge from his cousin and whoever else he found. He was livid and would get them all even if it meant forfeiting his own life. The sight that greeted him was a completely demolished backyard, his cousin and a compatriot who apparently heard him coming from the recent duel.

"Hello little Cousin Sirius! Didn't want your blood traitor friend and his mudblood to be alone in death? So glad to help!" Bellatrix taunted him with her baby voice. Her fellow attacker chortled at that. Her momentary distraction gave an opening though, and the viciousness shocked Sirius.

" _CRUCIO!"_ came Lily's voice from a shattered window and the violent red spell hit Bellatrix's side, causing her to collapse in pain.

Sirius only missed a beat and sent an _expulso_ at the other attacker before he reacted. He figured Lily, who was sometimes a scary powerful and skilled witch, could take on Bellatrix while he dealt with the other. He assumed the attacker was Rudolphus Lestrange, Bellatrix's husband, but wasn't sure due to him wearing the Death Eater mask unlike his wife. Usually Rudolphus used brute force to overpower his opponents with emphasis on The Killing and Cruciatus Curses to put them down.

With an " _Avada Kedavra_!" the fight was on and Sirius moved to his left more so he could keep Bellatrix in his line of vision and retaliated Rudolphus, he was sure now.

" _Fulminis Ictu_!" A dreadfully hard spell to dodge, lightning flew from Sirius' wand briefly before a second Killing Curse came flying towards him, allowing Rudolphus to conjure stone to absorb the energy and banish it towards him.

" _Reducto_ " the stone was shattered, " _Pulsus_ " and banished right back, which Rudolphus let hit him in order to get his next spell off.

" _Sanguineus fervefacio_!" Blood boiling curse, nasty, Sirius thought to himself but quickly dodged to the right while casting.

" _Impedimenta_! _Stupefy_! _Incarcerous_!" Sirius let the well practised spell chain rapidly fly in the hope it would find a hole in his opponent's defences. He wanted this fight over with quick. Unfortunately Rudolphus overpowered the Impediment Jinx enough to be able to dodge the Stupefying Charm, but his left side was caught in the ropes produced by the last spell, his left arm was pinned to his body and legs were tangled with rope. Knowing he was trapped Rudolphus let loose a set of Killing Curses.

Sirius knew he had to end this before he got killed himself so focusing all his anger cast an " _Avada Kedavra_ " of his own. Not expecting his opponent to cast that, a surprised Rudolphus looked at Sirius before the green spell hit him right in his incapacitated shoulder. Letting out the breath he'd been holding, Sirius turned to see an unconscious Bellatrix caught in ropes herself and twitching noticeably.

"Lily?! It's Sirius! Are you okay?" Sirius called out. He quickly made his way to the back door, deftly flicking his wand to check for magic someone might have put up in case they had to fall back. Finding something and deciding not to chance it, he made his way over to the window and vaulted himself through after clearing some broken glass. Only to be met with the sight of the body of his best friend, James Potter.

"No, he's just stunned," he said outloud to himself. " _Ennervate_!" Nothing happened. "Damnit! _Ennervate_!" Still nothing. Sirius crashed to the floor and checked for a pulse. When he couldn't find one he felt the world stop and just looked at his brother, his real brother, who had gone through everything with him together. Even before Hogwarts when James would keep him company when Aunt Dorea, James' mum and Sirius' Great Aunt, came to family meetings and showed him not everyone was the twisted backwards bigots his immediate family was. All through the Marauders' time at Hogwarts, running away to his house after fifth year, mourning Charlus and Dorea together, being best man at James and Lily's wedding, the Blood War that followed and the entertainment Sirius made sure to bring James throughout his hiding to protect Harry. Harry. Oh Merlin, Harry was going to grow up without a father, not only that but the most qualified, best person for the job. Sirius himself was never serious, he wryly thought, not like James who could face facts and do whatever needed to be done. Lily would probably be able to make sure Harry grew up to be a strong, brave and smart man like he would with James but it would never be the same. Sirius sat there looking at the face of his friend, completely oblivious to the world around him. He most likely would not have moved for a long time but he heard Lily's voice scream, causing him to jump and brandish his wand.

"Not Harry, not Harry, please not Harry! Please no, take me, kill me instead! Not Harry! Please, have mercy…have mercy!"

Sirius was at the stairs before deep laughter rang out and was halfway up them before the incantation of the Killing Curse was said and he heard a body drop to the floor. As fast as he could he made it to Harry's nursery and banged the door open while rapidly casting, " _Stupefy_! _Stupefy_! _Stupefy_! _Stupefy_!" four times in case the attacker cast a shield charm. They had, but the third spell shattered the shield allowing the fourth to hit him. Corban Yaxley, who must have been on the other side of the house and slipped unnoticed past him, now occupied the floor next to a limp Lily Potter who still had wet tear stains down her face. Disgusted, Sirius cast another _stupefy_ as well as an _incarcerous_ on the Death Eater and levitated him out into the hall, not worried about him hitting the doorframe on the way out. Looking at Lily Sirius could only think how she would have wanted to do what was best for Harry so pausing to manually close her eyelids and clean the tear tracks, Sirius stood and grabbed Harry as well as the blankets on his bed, it was a cold late Autumn night after all, and promised to something, anything, somewhere to make sure he would be raised to make his parents proud.

"Pa' foo'?" Little Harry warily asked.

Sirius replied thickly, "Yeah, that's me kiddo. We gotta get you out of here. I know where to go."

"Mummy?" Harry pointed at Lily.

It broke Sirius heart but he said, "Uh-huh, but we gotta go. Okay? Worry about Mummy later." With that, he made his way out of the nursery and down the stairs to leave the house. As he did he thought of Wormtail, the fucking traitor! How could he do that to his friends?! Sirius knew something was wrong when he wasn't at his house. Seething but knowing he had another task to take care of first, he promised to seek out the traitor to kill him himself, and enjoy it too. Two amazing people had died tonight because of Wormtail and Sirius wanted revenge. With a glance towards the room James was in, a sight he didn't want nor could see again, Sirius exited the house and quickly walked to his motorcycle, but seeing it significantly damaged continued along the street until he felt he had passed the wards and disapparated with a slight ' _pop_.'

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Materialising in front of a two story suburban house outside of Bristol, Sirius hoped that the wards wouldn't be anything nasty and have an adverse reaction to Harry, he couldn't remember if he was keyed in or not. Hastily deciding to chance it, because he was planning on only dropping Harry off before hunting down the traitorous rat, he made his way from the sidewalk. Harry just looked around in wonderment, not having been outside very much in his short and sheltered life. Thankfully when they crossed the ward line nothing happened to Harry.

"ANDY! I need your help! ANDY! IT'S SIRIUS!" he called out, approaching the front door he thankfully saw a light turn on. He knocked urgently to make sure the point was across and waited.

A woman's voice came from the other side of the door, wary and strong, "Who's there?"

"It's Sirius, Andy! And I really need your help. Now, please! I've got James and Lily's son with me!"

"Oh no, is he hurt?" came a reply, Andromeda was a Healer after all, "just to make sure, what did Alphard give me the last time both of us were visiting?"

Despite the circumstances Sirius couldn't help but be amused by that, "A case of spiced rum for 'a job well done spurning the family.' Now open the Merlin damned door, witch!"

Andromeda Tonks opened the door to Sirius, revealing her curly dark brown hair, an aristocratic noble face along with sharp grey eyes and tall slim body wrapped in a bathrobe. In fact, if not for the robe Sirius could not have guessed she had just gotten out of bed. Proceeding to usher him inside to a living room she asked, "What happened, Sirius?"

"James…" He took a shuddering and fortifying breath, "James and Lily are dead." In an instant, her wand was pointed directly at his head. Sirius thought what would cause that for a second before it clicked, "Wait Andy, wait! It was Peter! He was the Secret-Keeper. Not me! Just let me explain! Please!"

"Why don't you slowly set Harry down and then sit somewhere I can keep my wand on you?" Andromeda said stoically.

Sirius slowly and in such a way that Andromeda could see exactly what he was doing at all times set Harry down so he was sitting in an armchair, still wrapped in blankets, and proceeded to sit on a couch next to it with his arms spread out eagle over the top. "You need to understand that we didn't know who to trust, people dying all the time and there was obviously traitors within both Albus Dumbledore's Order and the Aurors. With You-Know-Who and his Death Eaters targeting the Potters and their hiding spots continuously being found, I convinced James and Lily that I could be a decoy. I know I can handle myself. So we used Peter as the real Secret-Keeper while anyone else, including the traitor, would come after me… Oh my god it's my fault! MY FAULT!" He sobbed, looking at Andromeda with a contorted look on his face, "I practically gave them to the Death Eaters!"

Andromeda hit Sirius with a silencing spell and hissed, "We have multiple young children here. Keep it down."

But Sirius just looked at her and motioned for her to cancel the spell, which she did. "I only came here to get Harry to you, I know you can look after him. Please. I'm going to go kill that filthy rat!" With that, he jumped and went to the door, blocking a Stupefying Charm from Andromeda, made his way to the sidewalk and end of the wards and was gone.

Harry, who had been silent during the confrontation, just looked around and asked "Pa' foo'?"

Andromeda sighed, flicked her wand at the door to close and lock it, "Yes Harry, Sirius is being a stupid, brash idiot and I need to contact the Aurors."

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	2. Surviving The Times

A/N: Awesome response with followers and favorites to Chapter 1, though I am sorry to say I was impatient to post it and if I had held on to it and proofread it a few more times, like I have since posting it, several technical errors wouldn't have been present. Anyway I was hoping for more reviews, but I guess that means my writing is decent enough? Honestly morbidly anticipating someone trying to rip me a new one.

A/N 2: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 2: Surviving The Times

After eleven years of open conflict preceded by ten years of increasing tensions, the morning of November 1, 1981, arrived with a variety of emotions across Wizarding Britain. The Ministry for Magic had been in dire straights for the past two years, barely able to keep order amidst the community between the protests and violence that had erupted throughout the country in addition to treachery within the Ministry itself. There was widespread relief that major strides had been made in quelling the disease that was the Death Eaters. At the same time, people who could be associated with them were stressed they would be thrown under the bus even though they had done nothing overtly illegal. Apprehensive citizens kept wary for any sign of counter attack by the now leaderless criminal organisation to reassert their position, fortunately a vigilant law enforcement force was already moving to prevent those exact actions. Those that had actively served the recently fallen dark lord were frantically either fleeing the country or attempting to wriggle their way out of punishment for their numerous crimes.

The Longbottom couple had been very popular and successful Aurors with a reputation of being strong fighters and fair handed authorities. Though they may have been murdered, they would not be forgotten and while people were raising their glasses toasting their son Neville Longbottom the Boy-Who-Lived, in victory over Voldemort, people were recounting interactions with the couple as well. Tidings of the attack on the Potters reached the majority of people after midnight and much like the Longbottoms, people were sad of their loss but news of the death of the Lestrange brothers and capture of Bellatrix Lestrange gave people reason to celebrate, it was also rumored something had happened to Bellatrix to send her into shock. Astonishment was the prevalent reaction when people were told that a well known prosecutor by the name of Corban Yaxley was captured as well, but most surprising the son of the current Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and Hit-Wizard, Bartemius Crouch Junior, was dead at the scene clad in Death Eater robes and mask.

Albus Dumbledore; the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot Parliament, Headmaster of Britain's wizarding school Hogwarts and leader of the vigilante informant organisation The Order of the Phoenix, was pensive and thoroughly exhausted. Considering how Tom Riddle had attacked the Longbottoms last night when he had been sure to attack the Potters but appointed his followers to attack the family in his stead perplexed him. Albus had been sure that the Potter boy was the one in the prophecy, he was born closer to the end of July, was a half-blood like Tom himself which he had been sure to take offence at and promised to be the more powerful of the two infants. Young Neville Longbottom had been marked by Voldemort though, thus making him the one of prophecy, nevertheless, Albus would want to keep a keen eye on Harry Potter. Unfortunately he couldn't find the child to see if he was marked in some way as he had been dealing with the Longbottom situation the previous night when the Potters' had been attacked. The house in which Tom's curse had backfired caught aflame forcing himself and Hagrid, the first person he had encountered on the way to assess what had occurred, to act quickly. He could only hope that a friend of the Potters had been the one to abduct the child and not their betrayer, Sirius Black. Fortunately the betrayer of the Longbottoms, Kingsley Shacklebolt, had been apprehended immediately after news of their deaths had arrived at the Auror Office, rightfully already sitting in Azkaban Prison.

The rest of the night had been spent cataloguing the incoming captured Death Eaters, it was a part of his job as Chief Warlock, from a series of raids that were assembled on learning of Voldemort's fall, some thirty of them all in various prison cells. He'd contacted various members of the Order to make sure the appropriate information arrived in proper hands for maximum effectiveness on these raids as well. Now it was eight in the morning and he was ready for sleep, yet he would be required to address the students of Hogwarts in the Great Hall followed by a staff meeting to make sure there was neither retaliation from nor persecution of those perceived to be on the wrong side of the conflict, everyone would learn to forgive in good time.

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When she had woken up last night just before midnight with her father standing in the doorway to her bedroom, Nymphadora Tonks had been scared something was wrong with her mum. But he had apologised for waking her and told her he was only being safe while they had a visitor. When she heard someone who sounded like her Uncle Sirius yelling and her dad tensely pointing his wand out in the hall, she didn't know what to think. When a minute later her dad relaxed and told her to go back to sleep, that he would make sure everything was alright, she internally told herself there was no way she'd just do that, she wanted to know what was going on! Slowly easing her bedroom door open and hearing the murmur of her parents' voices coming from the stairs, she pattered as silently as possible down to the corner of the entry to the front room where her parents were.

"-obviously we can keep him long term if you want to, I just want to make sure you're ready for that commitment Andromeda." Her father, Ted Tonks, said. Keep what? Or who? This was weird.

"I'm positive. Anyway, there aren't many other options, magic help any child raised by Sirius Black." What was Sirius doing with a kid? Nymphadora thought this was getting so, so, so weird. "Tomorrow you'll have to contact that Order of his and get them to get anything we'll need from the cottage and lock it down after the Aurors leave. Also we'll have to take care of the paperwork on Monday if the Ministry is not too busy running around as if they were headless chickens." What had happened that the Ministry was so busy? "Why don't you go transfigure something for him to sleep on in the extra bedroom, I still need to floo the Aurors." She heard a young child start crying along with her dad trying to calm it, and took that as her cue to make a hasty and stealthy retreat to her room again, with far more questions than before. As she heard her father walk close to her room, all sound from outside abruptly ceased and she knew there had been a silencing ward put on the outside of her room and any opportunity for answers was over for the night. But she laid there for a long time thinking about what she'd heard. Would she have a brother now if her parents were actually keeping 'him'? She supposed it'd be cool to have a brother, a lot of other people at school had them and it seemed fun.

The next morning Nymphadora awoke to her mum letting herself into her bedroom after knocking on the door. Gracefully sitting on the edge of her bed she said, "it's already ten in the morning Nymphadora are you hiding in your room? I know you must have questions from last night."

Dora knew she shouldn't say anything about what she had overheard. "No Mum, I woke up just now. What happened? Dad said everything was alright."

"Well for us it is alright, but something very sad has happened. Do you remember how there are bad wizards fighting right now?" She nodded, there were a lot of bad things happening in the wizarding world for as long as she could remember, although her parents told her it had not always been like that. "They attacked our friends James and Lily last night and they're dead now," Andromeda said gently. Dora nodded again, she had met them a few times though it had been a very long time, over a year she thought. Still, she was sad for them. They were nice people and James seemed like a good friend of Sirius. That still didn't explain the child, though. "Since the last time we saw them they had a son, named Harry, who survived the attack last night. He's very young and doesn't have anyone to take care of him now, so your father and I have decided to have him. He will be like a brother to you, hopefully. Are you ok with that?"

Dora knew she was, having thought about it already last night, "I am! It sounds like a lot of fun! When can I see him? Now?" She asked excitedly and smiled at her mum to make sure she knew she meant it.

"I suppose. But you should know he's asking for his mum and dad right now… Once he gets bored of meeting a new person he'll go back to that, don't be upset when that happens. He's in the front room with your father right now. Also, you slept through breakfast but I'll be happy to reheat the french toast your father made earlier for you when you're hungry," Andromeda told her daughter.

"Thanks Mum!" Dora said as she climbed out from between her blankets and still in her pyjamas went downstairs in search of her new brother.

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Word had been spread throughout several ministry departments that Sirius Black was, at the moment, a danger to himself and those around him because he had not taken the loss of the Potters well and was recklessly hunting down Peter Pettigrew, the person who delivered the location of the Potters to the Dark Lord. So when Cornelius Fudge arrived at the scene of a magical catastrophe before the Aurors to be met with the sight of a haggard Sirius Black on his knees in front of a large crater surrounded by mangled bodies and laughing like a maniac, he was rightly uneasy. Deciding that the man looked like he wasn't moving anytime soon, Cornelius grabbed the nearest muggle and began interrogating her. It seemed Pettigrew had attempted to frame Black for betraying the Potters right before the street had exploded. Well that was cunning of Pettigrew but fortunately word otherwise had gotten out, Cornelius thought as he modified the muggle's memories and sent her on her way. Now to do that only forty more times.

Somewhere along the way the Aurors and a few Hit-Wizards along with another helper from the Magical Catastrophes Department had shown up to assist clearing up the muggles and to take Black in for an interrogation, while he may not have betrayed the Potters he had been found at the scene of a crime with twelve dead muggles and a wizard. Luckily corroborating a story for the muggles had proven easy because a pipe filled with gas was under the street and had exploded, one of the muggles even said they were all incredibly lucky the area wasn't up in flames. Rather telling about muggles, that. Putting things which could explode under streets was rather stupid. Finally making it back to the ministry just before lunch, Cornelius wanted nothing more than to go to a pub for a hearty lunch, but his duty was to submit a report to the DMLE as soon as possible. Almost done with the report thirty minutes later, there was a knock on the edge of his cubicle and when he looked up saw Lucius Malfoy, who had until just last night been under the Imperius Curse from You-Know-Who himself, standing there.

"Good afternoon Mr. Malfoy. I hope this won't take long, I have things to be doing. What can I help with?" Cornelius asked curtly.

Malfoy pulled his wand and gave it several intricate motions before speaking, "Hello Mr. Fudge, I have run into a problem and you seem to be the best person who can help me. Ah, you see I heard that Sirius Black had been taken in for questioning recently. As I am married to his cousin I was hoping if I could hear the details concerning his detention."

"But of course. You see, Peter Pettigrew attempted to frame Black for betraying the Potters hiding location to You-Know-Who's followers before the street blew up. There wasn't much they could get out of Black, he seemed quite deranged, I heard they were going to dose him full of Calming Draught and then question him over how twelve muggles and Pettigrew died."

"So no chance of his incarceration in Azkaban at this point?" Malfoy asked pointedly.

"I'm afraid I'm not the person to talk to, he's in the hands of the Aurors at the moment. Killing twelve muggles is a punishable crime albeit not gravely severe, and I haven't a clue whether Pettigrew committed suicide or Black caused the explosion. But the Aurors probably cast _priori incantato_ and he wasn't being put in handcuffs when they left with him."

"Very well, thank you for your time." Malfoy stalked off looking slightly dejected, even if he was trying to hide it, which meant he was very glum Cornelius thought, how odd.

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She loved it every time without fail when her husband was on a power trip, and tonight at the Ministry Ball he was in his element at its prime. Sliding from department heads to other Wizengamot members and making sure they showcased their opulence while walking past the press present the two of them worked flawlessly in tandem. A suggestion here, enticed by a concession there, followed with a promise of further dialogue and a recommendation on the personal level, the game was executed with precision. Both of them had been raised at the pinnacle of society, they had been brushing elbows with privileged class elites before even attending Hogwarts, allowing them to perform at a level that belied their young ages. The Ministry was on its way into the palm of her husband's hand, while she was seen as the jewel of society who facilitated her husband's house of cards. Both of them were doing exactly what they had dreamed of when they were children and in the future they would go even further, his father was soon to retire from high society, leaving him with increased resources, contacts and benefits. Indeed it was absolutely wonderful to be Narcissa Malfoy. Just as she had that thought though her husband stumbled, and at the edge of her vision she noticed several other followers of the Dark Lord do so as well.

Her husband looked at her with panic in his eyes and she could tell he was thinking furiously, she turned to her conversational partners saying, "excuse us please, I'd like a word with Lucius." He turned to leave and she took his arm and followed.

Once they were outside of the hall he proclaimed, "Cissa, I'm sorry our family is going to lose a significant amount of reputation but it is better than what fate awaits us otherwise. Let us find some seclusion before taking the next step."

It was in a lift that Lucius had used some spell to freeze they found themselves and Narcissa was supremely curious but knew not to ask questions of him yet, otherwise his train of thought may be disturbed. "The Dark Lord has suffered some mortal injury and my connection to him has been severed. He may even be dead as we speak," he explained. She could only intake a sharp breath and stare at him in shock. He continued, "Indeed if things go poorly I will be outed and you along with me. Therefore I propose we go about obliviating ourselves of anything incriminating and claiming the Dark Lord himself cast the Imperius Curse on us. If we go straight to the DMLE immediately there will be no need for them to be suspicious of us. Are you prepared to take that course of action?"

"Anything, Lucius."

The DMLE had not heard any part of the news yet and quickly was in a frenzy organising themselves, leaving them with three Aurors, and a dicta-quill in an interrogation room after they had explained their situation. Two hours later they had given all the information they could, ready to make their way home to their infant son. Because they were given the classification of informants leaving the department included some quick scheming and timed movements in order to dodge Death Eaters who were already being apprehended. It was when they were having a final cup of calming tea that Lucius brought up something interesting he had heard while waiting for them to bring a prisoner through the department.

"You know Cissa, they said your blood-traitor cousin was a danger to himself and those around him. He always was rather impetuous."

"I care not for the fool," she replied frostily.

"Very well, then I shall see if there is a chance for him to be passed over in the line of succession in the Black family. Our son Draco would be the next candidate, no?" Lucius mused to his wife, to which she made a noncommittal noise he took for assent.

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	3. Growing Pains

**A/N: PLEASE READ THIS NOTE! THIS CHAPTER WILL COVER SERIOUS AND CONTROVERSIAL TOPICS. THERE WILL BE MENTIONS OF RAPE AND ALCOHOLISM. IF THIS BOTHERS YOU THEN I AM SORRY, YOU ARE FREE TO NOT READ THIS CHAPTER OR STORY.** Other than that, this is the last chapter not from Harry's perspective (finally!) and I hope things will go more smoothly from there. Sirius and Snape were unexpectedly difficult to write, I think it'll be easier from Harry's perspective. Also, I hope no one thinks I'm bashing the Weasleys from the one comment made about them in this chapter, that is not my intention. Lastly, I feel I should point out it is also not my intention for Harry to be a 'Lord' of some sort. That's Sirius' job, Harry's an...accomplice? Henchman? Facilitator? Regardless, his heritage won't play any political role. History of the Potters next chapter!

A/N 2: Other than that, this is the last chapter not from Harry's perspective (finally!) and I hope things will go more smoothly from there. Sirius and Snape were unexpectedly difficult to write, I think it'll be easier from Harry's perspective. Also, I hope no one thinks I'm bashing the Weasleys from the one comment made about them in this chapter, that is not my intention. Lastly, I feel I should point out it is also not my intention for Harry to be a 'Lord' of some sort. That's Sirius' job, Harry's an...accomplice? Henchman? Facilitator? Regardless, his heritage won't play any political role. History of the Potters next chapter!

A/N 3: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 3: Growing Pains

Nymphadora Tonks was bewildered as she did one last check to make sure everything she would need for her first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was packed away in her trunk. She needn't have worried though, her mum who was a whole lot neater than her had packed everything except her wand, 14 inches of exceptionally springy dogwood with a unicorn hair core. She was thrilled to be starting her magical education, with new places to explore and friends to make and most importantly she didn't have to hide her metamorphic abilities. Having to use muggle hair dye every two weeks and wearing charmed glasses simply so she could attend muggle primary school was a hassle. On the other hand, leaving her family behind would be a bitter pill to swallow. Her parents who always encouraged her to work hard and have fun, Harry was quickly growing up and this year would be attending his second and final year of preschool for magicals and squibs preparing them to attend muggle primary school and finally Sirius, who was more than glad to help out her parents by watching the kids or pick her up from school and always knew how to make people laugh.

Sirius cornered Dora when he offered to help get her trunk, while Andromeda and Ted were making sure Harry was ready to head to King's Cross Station to see her off on the Hogwarts Express. There was a bone he had to pick with Filch the Hogwarts caretaker, and he knew Dora would be up for the job. "So Dora, you know of the Marauders' awesomeness, but there was a secret to our success. Especially in pulling off some of our most divine performances, I mean the Toad Incident of 1976 was the first of many and we both know how hilarious that was."

Dora looked up at Sirius with wide eyes, "What do you mean? Is it something I need to know for Hogwarts?"

Sirius laughed, "Hahaha no, but it'll make your time there more exciting. There is a condition though, you must earn it. The rest is up to you."

"What do I need to do?! I can do it! I'll make my friends help too!" Dora was practically bouncing with excitement, the stories of the Marauders' pranks were her favourite, the ones that made people laugh and smile were food for her soul.

"There's a story here and it goes something like, I was sneaking back into the castle from Hogsmeade after Gryffindor won the Quidditch Cup in seventh year and didn't look before exiting a secret passage and was caught by Filch. I was stuffed to the gills with everything a good party needs; fireworks, firewhiskey, butterbeer, the whole works and caught red handed. Filch searched me down and literally confiscated everything but my wand and the clothes on my back! There was a valuable parchment in that stuff, he thought it was some joke product. In fact, it was the Marauder's Map. A map of Hogwarts and everyone in it, every passage and every being, even Mrs. Norris the cat! Use it well and like us, you'll be unstoppable!"

"Whoa, that is so wicked! So I have to get it?"

"Definitely. It's probably in his office somewhere, which is on the second floor. From my abundant visits to it I know there's a cabinet named 'Confiscated and Highly Dangerous', I'd wager it will be in there. All you have to do is find some way to get him out of his office long enough to find it. And what is the Marauder motto?"

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good, and mischief managed," Dora replied.

"Good, that's all you need to know. Come on, let's not keep the rest waiting." With that, he hauled Dora's trunk into the hall and proceeded to levitate it down the stairs, followed by a jubilant Dora.

Upon arriving in the front room, the two of them saw everyone else ready to floo off to the station, everyone dressed in casual muggle clothes except her. Her mother, looking impeccable as ever came over to fuss over her robes and hair, which was purposefully black and messy like Harry's and that she enjoyed matching with the colour of green eyes his were, it was like they actually were siblings! "Mum, it's just going to get messed up in the floo anyway. Don't see why you bother," she mumbled.

"It's the principle of the matter, Nymphadora."

Dora, who hated her full name, groaned while Sirius snickered and Harry smiled. "Muuuummm."

Not even phased Andromeda continued, "Now do you have your wand? Didn't take anything out of your trunk?"

"Of course Mum, and a pack of self-shuffling playing cards for the train," Dora replied.

"Alright, give your trunk to your father so he can floo with it. Sirius, you floo first so you can help Ted with it. Nymphadora after, and Harry and I will follow last," Andromeda directed.

"Why can't I floo with my godson? I didn't get to go last time!" Sirius exclaimed, only to be given a glowering venomous look from Andromeda with some unannounced meaning. He pouted, "Fine," and proceeded to the fireplace to floo to the station.

After that things went as planned and everyone arrived in the receiving room, though Dora tripped on her way out of the floo and Harry looked woozy, neither of them used to the feeling of being sucked down a giant drain and spinning fast while there was a deafening roar in their ears. By the time Dora and Harry were recovered from the trip, Dora's trunk was on a trolley courtesy of Sirius and Ted and she was ready to push it through the muggle part of the station to Platform 93/4. They all knew where the entrance was, but the idea of running into a seemingly solid brick wall was daunting to anyone their first time. Fortunately, Ted Tonks noticed his daughter's hesitation, "Why don't I go with you, Dora?" He took one side of the trolley while Dora took the other and walked at a quick speed at the wall. The two of them disappeared right into the wall, shortly followed by Sirius, Harry and Andy.

On the platform Andromeda suggested that Harry go with Ted and Dora while they found a compartment for her and her trunk. "Now Sirius," she said in a voice that brokered no argument once they were out of hearing range, "Magic knows you have been an alcoholic for years now. While I don't like your shortcomings, and I have no power over you to stop them, I do have the ability to keep your drinking, smoking and womanising away from Harry and Nymphadora as per our earlier agreement. I have no problem with you doing things with Harry, but I know you have already drank this morning. While you may be extremely functional, anything could happen and neither of them should chance a magical accident from the floo or apparating. Understood?"

"Bloody hell Andy, it's nothing. Not even 3 shots, I'm damn near sober and I've flooed a million times, it would have been fine."

"I. Don't. Care. Sirius," she growled at him quietly, as the others were coming back to say final goodbyes with fifteen minutes before the train left.

Tearful goodbyes and hugs, a promise to write tonight with what house she was sorted into, wishes of good luck over the school year, a promise to her mother to stay out of trouble but while she hugged Sirius she promised to not get caught and a promise to be home for Winter Break followed Dora as she had to run in order to make it onto the train before it left. Once in her compartment, which had another first year girl she had met when finding a place for her trunk, she leant out of the window to wave at her family as the train pulled away.

Standing on the platform, Harry turned to Sirius once the train was out of sight and asked, "Sirius, what's 'mudblood'?" At this the man next to them, who looked worn and had bright orange hair, turned and glared at Sirius before stalking off.

Sirius sighed and muttered, "Just had to be next to Weasley. They already have enough reasons to hate our family." He squatted down next to Harry and looked him in the eyes wondering how to answer. "Look, Harry, you know what bullies are?"

Harry nodded, "They're mean and bad."

"Right, well people who say mudblood are bullies being mean. It's not a nice word," Sirius responded.

"But what is it?"

"It's people like Ted, with non-magical parents. Now don't worry about it until you're older, it's an adult word. Let's go get some lunch with Remus while Ted and Andy go to whatever appointment they have and won't tell me about," Sirius finished a little louder so the people mentioned would hear.

"I'm not really sure myself, Dromeda's keeping it top secret," Ted added.

"I'm sure if you knew, Sirius, you wouldn't want to be involved, but I will tell you later. Remember what we talked about earlier, we'll see you in two hours," Andromeda concluded before taking Ted's arm and heading to the barrier between the magical and muggle worlds.

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The fireplace in the front room of the Tonks' residence roared with green flames briefly before dying down to reveal an average height man with unusually pale skin, in stark contrast to his black hair and flowing black robes. He had a sneer on his face, looking as if he would rather be anywhere else. He cast a surveying glance around the room before speaking, "The mutt and brat are not present?"

"No, Mister Snape. It is as you requested, we have two hours for what you wish to speak to us about. You said this was about Lily, but I have no idea other than that," Andromeda said acerbically.

Ted continued, "Professor Severus Snape, welcome. Let's sit before proceeding. Can I get you anything for refreshment?"

Severus replied in the negative, and rather than sitting in one of the home's chairs conjured a stiff wooden chair with a motion of his wand. "May I put up eavesdropping prevention charms?" To which Ted motioned for him to continue. "The Headmaster does not know of either my presence here today nor what we are about to discuss. You will do best to keep it that way, there will be...consequences where the aforementioned man is concerned otherwise."

Andromeda raised an eyebrow, "Indeed? Very well."

Severus stood and began pacing, after several cycles he stopped and asked, "What do you know of Lily Evans' magical abilities?"

Neither of the other people in the room replied instantly, knowing it would be better to think before answering, which Ted did. "Well she was a charms prodigy, very strong in potions and a highly proficient dueller excelling in Defense, mainly. Although I remember there really wasn't an area of magic she couldn't perform skillfully. Maybe Magical Creatures?"

"Essentially, but very limited. That is within the perspective of a Hogwarts education. She was much more. But most importantly, her control of magic was nearly unprecedented and she was naturally able in the mind arts, despite never developing or employing her abilities to her benefit," Severus said reverently, and continued his pacing. A minute later he asked, "who recently has been known for what you have just told me and I have informed you?"

Andromeda thought she understood but the thought occurring to her made no sense, "But Lily was a muggleborn. What does she have to do with the Dark Lord? Surely he would not have trained her." She looked over to her husband, who only shrugged.

Severus returned to his conjured chair and looked Andromeda in the eyes before speaking, "Magical affinities are often passed down through bloodlines. The man who raised Lily with her mother was not her father."

Ted let out a gasp, "what?" While Andromeda stared at Severus.

Severus simply continued, "Before our first year I told Lily to partake a bloodline test, if she was from a squibed line of heritage there may have been money in Gringotts. It showed her father as a 'Tom Riddle.' The Dark Lord had just begun his reign of terror then, but from the goblin's reaction that is when we first knew. Only I am in possession of this information, and now you. I implore you to not be foolish with it. It is why I inquired about your occlumency ability."

A few moments of silence before Andromeda said the pertinent word, "Rape? I cannot imagine anything less from the Dark Lord." Rape in the wizarding world was as harsh a crime as murder, something definitely unforgivable.

"We assumed so. Lily never attempted to legilimize her mother in search of obliviations, and never mentioned a word of it to her." Here Severus paused, apparently gathering his thoughts.

Andromeda asked the question on her mind, "did the Dark Lord know?"

"I do not believe so. Further, Lily actively and furiously fought anything to do with the Dark Arts, myself included," he allowed a grim smile to show itself on his face. "Potter, the arrogant bully, may have sullied any influence from her but your influence may be to his benefit. I have made this trip to ensure you found out now, rather than the mutt discovering him speaking parseltongue and doing something idiotic and rash, it would be in character no doubt. I will be off now." Severus ended the conversation and left via the floo. It had only been a hair past half an hour since his arrival, but the Tonks were sure they would need the remainder of the two hours in order to assort their thoughts on the subject, feelings for a boy as good as their son and plans on how to proceed.

Ted was the first to speak, "a very brusque man, but it seems his intentions are in the right place. Regardless of how unexpected this is, I don't see how it should change anything in regards to Harry."

Andromeda let out a slight sigh, "It does make things more difficult for us, though no more than Nymphadora's metamorphmagi talents. If people were to find out though the boy would be victimised like none other. The main question though, is do we tell Sirius? Somehow I doubt he would take it well."

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Two hours after Andromeda and Ted's departure from King's Cross Station Sirius and Harry, along with their friend Remus Lupin, returned there after an extended lunch and park visit. Sirius and Remus had discussed what they would be doing in the near future. Remus was going off to India to learn some native magic in the hope of controlling his werewolf transformations after tutoring several Hogwarts students over the summer, including Dora. Sirius was staying as a Hit-Wizard but his grandfather Arcturus was attempting to bring him back into the fold of the Black family, in a move to repair the damage to the family's reputation his father and mother as well as his Uncle Cygnus and Aunt Druella generated supporting Voldemort, Sirius assumed. Andromeda and Remus both were of the opinion that he should carefully consider it, especially with the seat on the Wizengamot that would be available to him eventually. He could be a positive force for change if he could moderate himself while dealing with stuffy politicians, and didn't he always complain how the Ministry needed a streamlining reorganisation? But Sirius was hesitant, the Black family had done him no favours, and while he was pretty sure his grandfather disagreed with his parents on certain political ideas there were some things he couldn't support, and his grandfather would want him to.

They were met warmly by Ted Tonks and he inquired how lunch went to which Harry exclaimed, "it was so cool! Sirius got hit by a girl! Then she called him funny names and hit him again!"

"Bloody Veronica Smethley, hoped I would never see her again," Sirius lamented.

"You did deserve it though, after what happened," Remus inserted. "Regardless, it was nice to be able to do this before leaving for my trip, I doubt I will return before next summer. Good luck in school Harry," he said before walking off towards the apparition point.

"I know you're curious who Dromeda and I met just now Sirius, come over and let's talk about it," Ted invited as they walked towards the floo. When the adults, including Andromeda, were situated in the lounge with a silencing ward put up and Harry was sent away, a tense discussion took place. "Your occlumency skills are acceptable, correct Sirius?" To which Sirius nodded.

Andromeda continued, "We were visited by an old friend of Lily's today with-"

"Who?" Sirius broke in.

"Thanks for interrupting Sirius, it doesn't matter though. What matters is what we were told. But first drink this," Andromeda handed him a light purple coloured potion. "You'll want it, honestly."

"How can I trust what you're telling me if it's so shocking that I need a Calming Draught and I don't know where it's coming from?"

"Because I said so, you dolt," Andromeda insisted. Sirius shot her a betrayed look before downing the potion. "For starters, Lily was not actually a muggleborn," she said easing Sirius into things while the potion took effect.

"Was she adopted? I met her sister once, no way they're related she looks like a horse. Lily looked a lot like her mum though. Maybe she was a niece? I dunno," Sirius puzzled.

"Well no," Ted answered. "Best those who knew could tell, her parents thought she was their daughter and treated her as such."

"So was there an affair? I wouldn't expect it from them, you never know though," Sirius acknowledged.

Andromeda composed herself before confessing, "no. No, it was much worse. It seems her mother was raped and obliviated by a wizard."

"What?! Merlin, that's horrible. I figure since we're not doing anything about it, he's dead now?" Sirius asked.

"Yes, very fortunately. His death was at the end of the Blood War. We think he had no idea there was a child involved, and that is also very fortunate. Lily would have probably been killed if he knew," Andromeda informed Sirius.

"Why would it have been so bad? Couldn't he have attempted to bribe them or something to keep quiet?" Sirius questioned.

Ted answered, "well it's more about who her biological father was than anything else. He was...not a reasonable person."

"Who?"

"Tom Riddle. He was-"

Sirius cut him off, "no way! No fucking way! Fuck." He collapsed back into the armchair he was in and reached into the inside pocket of his windbreaker to withdraw a liquor flask saying, "see Andy this is why I'm an alcoholic. Life as Sirius Black is never boring. Crazy every damn day, it's a damn dangerzone," and took a significant drink. "So what now? Lily was a good soul, obviously Harry won't automatically turn dark. We tell him not to talk to snakes? That people will be mean to him if they find out? Make sure he's a good little Gryffindor?" He then palpably shuddered and muttered, "Lily as a Dark Lady would've been so very scary."

Ted responded, "I think what house he's in shouldn't matter as long as he isn't doing things that are wrong. He should know beforehand, and if he ends up in Slytherin he'll know what he is getting into."

"Bah, there's no way Harry's going to be in Slytherin. He's definitely going to be either Gryffindor or Hufflepuff," Sirius replied.

Andromeda spoke up, "just don't rule it out Sirius, plenty of Slytherins are exceptional people. For the time being though, Ted and I agree with you, tell him talking to snakes is a secret he should keep otherwise people will be mean to him. Sometime before Hogwarts we'll explain the rest. He sees his parents as role models already, we'll keep telling him their stories and he'll turn out just fine."

"I know Lily kept a diary through school, James would always try to steal it. I think they're in the Gringotts vault with the stuff from Godric's Hollow, maybe the year before Hogwarts we give him the one from first year, and keep giving him one per year. It might not paint the best picture of James, but as long as he knows that it'll probably be ok. Keep him ahead in his studies too, Lily would want that," Sirius added. "If Harry's accidental magic was anything like Voldemorts, that would make a lot of sense. He has a helluva lot of control. It's a wonder Lily didn't break the Statute of Secrecy somehow. Alright, if I'm going to get a full night's rest in I need to go say goodbye to Harry, I'm working the early shift tomorrow. I should be available afternoons if you want me to watch him during the week by the way, and let me know what house Dora got into!" Sirius said as he dismissed himself from the room.

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	4. (Not the) Sideline Story

A/N: 10/10 I swear on my mother's future grave it will be plot relevant. Honestly.

A/N 2: Happy Holidays you wonderful people!

A/N 3: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 4: Sideline Story

The thick book closed with a snap and Harry Potter scowled as well as any ten-soon-to-be-eleven year old could. He had just finished reading about his family's history, all nine hundred and twenty years of it including additions made by his father. His parents basically planning out his life from when he was born did not sit well with him, thank you very much. Apparently being a family with a thousand years of proven history qualified you for the status of being an Ancient House, which theoretically would come to pass for the Potter family during his lifetime. His parents would have 'groomed' him to use this change in status accompanied by a reinvigoration of the family's potions business that had been stagnant for three generations to propel the family onto the Wizengamot. He probably would have gone along with it as well, he had high opinions of both his parents from hearing Sirius' many stories about them, growing up with them could only make that more so. Right? Something Sirius had told him about his childhood came to mind though, how he had been jealous of Harry's father because he wasn't from a Noble family, one with a seat currently on the Wizengamot, and didn't have any expectations of how to act, who to associate with or what he would do after Hogwarts in the future. That had led to Sirius trying to act like him and hating anyone who expected him to do otherwise, it had forced the distance between him and his family to swell and now that he was in charge of the family it had come back around to bite him, making his job much harder.

Perched in the window nook of his second story bedroom overlooking the street and neighbouring houses, he turned to look around his room. It wasn't large but plenty enough for him and rather typically decorated with only his bed, a desk with chair, dresser, wardrobe with mirror, a few posters and some artwork. It was a tough choice whether the desk or his current location was his favourite part about the room. The desk was in the corner and had a large bookcase situated on top of it facing the occupant, while it was made out of relatively inexpensive materials Harry knew when he was older he would definitely purchase a more sturdy version as he couldn't imagine a better desk for working at. On the other hand, the window nook which extended out of the room slightly was perfectly situated for reading or dozing and was outfitted with a set of comfortable pillows. The walls of his room were a light blue while the carpet was brown, overall it was comfortable, homely and organised. Andromeda said it was a nice contrast to Dora's room which was vibrant purple, haphazardly furnished and whenever she was home from Hogwarts in a constant state of disarray.

During his examination which ended with him staring out the window into the clear June sky, Harry considered how he felt about his parents' plan. He had always wanted to be a strong leader like his father was ever since he understood the stories Sirius told him, and from his mother's diary he knew she would accomplish any achievement she set her mind to. While not perfect by any means, he wanted to be the best parts of both his parents. James Potter was proud, noble and powerful, he was clever and talented with his magic, a transfiguration specialist and skilful duellist and finally a popular quidditch player, while Lily Evans was vivacious, witty and charming though she had a temper with a sharp tongue when the situation called for it, magically she was incredibly talented in many areas but particularly in charms, in which she was one of the youngest to obtain a Mastery, could dexterously control magic to perform her every whim and ultimately, potions. The potions expertise of his mum was particularly important to their plan obviously, though he didn't think he would like the subject much from what he'd read in Dora's old school books. Would they be disappointed in him for that? He supposed he would just make up for it by being even better in other areas.

From what he'd heard from Sirius, the Wizengamot wasn't something he wanted to get into but it would probably be smart to leave his options open. Dealing with all those snooty people was definitely something he could do, but he would be playing to beat them at their own game. How was he _Harry James_ , which was a very common and unimportant name be a match for someone with a name along the lines of _Draco Lucius_ , a cousin who he'd met a few times, when already he would be frowned upon as a half-blood? From the notes of his father in the family history book, James had wanted to name him Hardwin after the very first Potter, fitting to usher in a new era of the family, or Henry after Harry's great-grandfather who had ended the family's extended isolation from political matters, but his mum had stubbornly refused anything of the sort. It seemed that long term planning hadn't been one of his frankly amazing parents' strong suits.

Regardless, he'd definitely be talking to Andromeda later when she got home from working as a Healer at St. Mungo's, she knew pretty much everything about the magical world and had tried to teach as much as possible to him and Dora, though Dora had been much less receptive to these lessons. He knew that he could floo over to Sirius' house whenever he wanted, ever since he was eight and could floo without problems unless the floo was blocked which meant Sirius had a girl friend over or was doing some family thing. The one time around a year and a half ago Harry had gone over when Sirius hadn't yet thought to block the floo and seen a naked girl and Sirius together doing something was enough to convince his godfather to be diligent about blocking the floo when necessary. The following Talk that he had been given was mortifying enough he couldn't look the girls at school in the eyes for two weeks until Dora had come home for Winter Break and set him straight. But his current problem would need to be dealt with tactfully, a quality Sirius lacked but Andromeda had in droves, she could solve almost any problem and Harry really looked up to her for it.

The Potter family's self-imposed isolation from political matters turned out to be more of a business decision than anything else. Much like Harry, in the late eleventh century Hardwin Potter was not interested in potions and was required to find some other way to make a living. With the recent invasion and conquering by the Normans, builders were in high demand for the new aristocracy. Together with his wife Iolanthe Peverell, who was a gifted enchanter, the pair was able to build buildings, enchant them to be extraordinarily durable and then ward them if they were magical buildings. Around a hundred and twenty years after that there had been a brief period of internal strife and a Ralston Potter had taken a side in the conflict, the following decline in business was quite apparent and forced a doctrine of neutrality upon the family. It had served them well even when there wasn't significant strife, when there were established political arenas as neither side wanted the other to know their defences and the Potters could offer services to the whole population.

Unfortunately for the Potters, in the final goblin rebellion of 1859 part of the compromise was the ability for established goblin nations to hire witches and wizards to engage in non-aggressive activities such as dragon keeping, muggle relations, obliviating and most importantly, curse-breaking. Curse-breakers were adept enough at breaking wards the goblins figured it would be entirely possible to contract them to erect wards and make a pretty sum of money while they did it. Many wizarding families preferred the famed goblin wards which also came with the benefit of assuredly coming from a neutral party rather than putting the trust in fellow wizards. Thus the family business fell into insignificance. Despite this, there remained the constant side project of potion development, something the majority of generations felt was a safety net and lightly pursued as a hobby if they fancied themselves potioneers. Fleamont Potter grabbed opportunity and made the best of it by developing a highly effective hair taming potion that would give his son Henry and future generations a comfortable lifestyle for the near future. Since then the Potters began to involve themselves in political matters starting with Henry Potter's audacious public support to assist the muggles in the Great War, followed by his sons Charlus and Abraham actively fighting against the dark lord Grindelwald's forces some thirty years later with Abraham losing his life in the course of the conflict and Harry's father James, who fought against Voldemort.

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Since it was the last day before Dora would return from Hogwarts it was only Harry, Ted and Andromeda eating dinner together that night. Though Harry knew it was polite to not bring up serious topics during the meal, he felt it pertinent to let Andromeda know he wanted to talk to her afterwards. "Aunt Andy I finished the family history book today, some things my father wrote were unexpected. I was hoping after dinner you and I could talk about it. I just don't know what to do."

"Of course, so long as you do the dishes as per usual." Harry mentally scowled at that, he understood chores were important but Andromeda and Ted could wash dishes with magic no problem instead of him working with soap and a sponge for twenty minutes.

Once the dishes were washed the three of them had relocated to the living room, which was the front room of the house and contained a selection of an armchair, a loveseat and a couch surrounding a large fireplace. Harry liked to spread out over the loveseat in whatever fashion was comfortable at the time, but as this would be a serious discussion he sat at the edge of the seat. Harry didn't know where to start so he launched straight in, "ok so, in seventy years the Potters will be an Ancient House. My dad and mum figured if she discovered some new potions or make them better to get us a bunch of money, then I would make that into a potions business with what we already own. Both of those would get people to respect us enough that when an opening came up on the Wizengamot we'd be able to get it."

"Well it is good you are not taking this lightly," Andromeda started. "The first thing you need to understand about the Wizengamot is that the seats are everything short of hereditary. When someone with a seat retires they have the opportunity to recommend their replacement, usually one of their children or grandchildren. The Noble Houses all look out for each other so they generally accept the nomination, therefore the only way a new family to get on the Wizengamot is to convince the families they are just as important, or even more so than them. Then you have to deal with the family you forced out, they'll probably challenge you to an honour duel and there will be tensions for a few generations, so it matters which family's seat you're going to seize. It is a very delicate process," she lectured.

"Whoa, er, ok. I don't know what I want to do, really."

"The best option would probably be to keep your options open," Ted interjected. "Look you're not even at Hogwarts yet, and you'll have sixty-three years after you graduate to worry about it. While you're at Hogwarts, don't step on too many toes and figure out whether politics is something that interests you. Lord knows I have no desire to bicker all day or deal with the expectations that there are of politicians."

Andromeda continued, "Your mind could change at any time as well. Sirius, for example, had no desire to take up Grandfather Arcturus' seat until a law that would constrict Remus' ability to get a job was introduced to the Wizengamot. It had been a long time coming even if he won't admit it but that and his mother's death were major factors and it pushed him into action. I'm sure you know now he wouldn't want to be anywhere else, he feels like there's much more he can do in the Wizengamot than Hit-Wizard work. While it would be good to talk to Sirius, it would also be a smart idea to have him take you to speak to Arcturus, the man's been in politics for an eternity and won't mislead you."

"Thank you, but how would I do that? Or what would be the best way to do it? I guess that's what I'm asking," Harry said.

Ted motioned for Andromeda to answer this question. "No one is going to judge you for simply acting with proper mannerisms. Remember your lessons on high society, and never besmirch a person's opinion of you. Think that you are an outsider and be as diplomatic as possible to as many people as possible. You'll figure out who you want your friends to be and who you are with time, until then just do what feels right. While you're at it, look for problems before they become so, you'll learn to recognise and deal with them."

"Why don't you get Sirius to come with us to Diagon Alley after your Hogwarts letter comes on Sunday?" Ted asked, "you can talk with him about the Wizengamot after. He probably won't tell you anything different, but more opinions won't hurt."

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Sunday morning the entire Tonks family including Harry and joined by Sirius was having breakfast together awaiting Harry's Hogwarts letter. Dora had just returned from Hogwarts the previous day having completed her final year and was anxiously awaiting her N.E.W.T. results which would come at the same time next week, as she would need top marks to become an Auror.

"Sarah told me she planned on bringing Sophie to the alley today as well, Harry. I know you two get on well enough, it'll be good to start Hogwarts with a friend like I did with James," Sirius stated. Sarah Roper was Sirius' fiancée who he was marrying at the end of summer, ten years after the death of his previous fiancée Marlene McKinnon he'd moved on and was maneuvering into the full position of Lord Black with a family to continue the line. Sophie was Sarah's niece who was Harry's age, she had grown up in a blood supremacist family but for the past year had rapidly grown close to her aunt and soon to be uncle. Sirius and Sarah encouraged her free spirited ways and Harry thought she would be as close to Sirius as he was soon enough.

"That'll be cool. Sophie told me in her last letter how excited she was for Hogwarts. Her parents seem to think pushing her to listen to them will work. I think you've got her wrapped around your finger, Sirius," Harry said.

"Ha! As if, I think it's the other way around. I cleared out a whole room for her in Grimmauld Place the other week because she asked, for _next_ summer," Sirius replied.

As Sirius finished talking an ordinary looking owl came in through the window and dropped a letter on the table in front of Harry before immediately turning back outside. "Ok Nymphadora and Harry, dishes. Everyone get some robes on and meet in the front room, we'll leave for Diagon shortly," Andromeda directed once everyone finished eating.

Diagon Alley was nothing new to Harry, he had been here many times before but this time it was for his supplies for Hogwarts meaning there was a little more magic about this visit. It was still early so the alley was not crowded in the slightest bit and the peddlers hadn't set up yet, allowing the family moved through relatively quickly. The trunk shop smelled of wood shavings, Dora was her hyperactive self, bouncing off the walls with a constant flow of chatter, the alley's main bookshop was filled with an extensive variety of books and smelled of dust and old parchment. "I remember when this was only Flourish Books and Blotts' Bookstore was down the alley and competed with them," Ted commented.

"What happened?" Harry asked.

"One of the times Voldemort's forces attacked the alley Blotts was destroyed. Fortunately it didn't go up in flames and the two stores combined sometime in 1977."

"Yeah, right before my seventh year. Prices have been higher ever since apparently. At least that's what Sarah says," Sirius added.

"It makes sense if they have fewer major competitors," Andromeda concluded.

The next stop was Madam Malkin's Robes for Harry's school robes but while they were filing in they were accosted by a pair of familiar faces who were descending the steps of Gringotts. "Sirius!" Sarah Roper called out getting their attention. "It's good to see you all," she greeted. She was a slight and feminine figured beautiful witch with curly brown hair and blue eyes who carried herself with pronounced grace. Beside her, Sophie was a shorter and younger version with the sole exception of having black hair. After salutations were exchanged Sarah inquired, "Would everyone acquiesce to Sophie joining you in Madam Malkin's while Sirius and I get her supplies to catch up with what you have bought for Harry? That would allow us to join you for the remainder of the trip." To which there was a general reaction of assent.

While they were getting measured for robes Sophie addressed Dora, "I love how you dye your hair all the time. I'm a big fan of colours, they make everything more alive."

Dora's hair, which was the rich yellow of her recent Hogwarts House, was indeed very vibrant. "Oh, uh thanks. But I don't dye it, I'm a metamorphmagus." She quickly cycled her hair through a rainbow of colours, "though I'd be happy to help you muggle dye yours, it won't be neutralised with just a spell."

Sophie sighed wistfully, "That'd be cool! But there's no way my parents would like that. That's awesome you're a metamorphmagus, to never need glamour charms or makeup."

"Eh, it has its ups and downs," Dora replied.

By the time their robes and cloaks were ready, equipped with a slowly reversing shrinking charm so they would grow with their bodies to a certain extent, Sirius and Sarah had returned with a trunk containing the first year books for Sophie. The rest of the trip through Diagon Alley went smoothly with amicable conversation while purchasing a pair of cauldrons, potion phials, potion ingredient scales, telescopes and writing supplies before the group decided it was time to stop for lunch before heading to Ollivander's to purchase wands.

It was during lunch Harry brought up the thing that had been bothering him for the past three days, "Sirius, after we're done can I talk to you about Potter family stuff?"

"Yeah, whatever you want. We can talk about it now if you want."

"I dunno, it's pretty important."

"It is something you'll want to think about Sirius, not some petty thing to discuss over lunch," Andromeda interrupted looking Sirius in the eyes.

"Alright kiddo, well why don't you, Sophie and Sarah come over once we're done here and stay for dinner. The girls can spend time together while we talk?" He inquired, to which Sarah and Sophie nodded.

When they were outside of Ollivander's narrow and shabby shop Sirius stopped and put a hand on Harry's shoulder. "You wanna outprank the great Ollivander himself?"

"Pranks aren't really my thing Sirius, but if you want to."

"Good, this is more a test for you than anything else anyway. So Ollivander tries to surprise his customers by greeting them from the corner behind them. You know how magicals can usually sense other magicals when they're near them?" Harry nodded, he'd read about it in one of Dora's books. "Well once we're in the shop try as hard as you can to feel where Ollivander is, I doubt he's actively hiding his magic. Even if you can't sense him, I'll put my hand on the shoulder of the side he's on. As soon as you can sense him, or feel my hand, you gotta turn and greet him, alright? Give him a nice little shock to break up his probably boring life," Sirius explained.

"Ok let's go," Harry said as he went into the shop with Sirius behind him and tried to _push_ out from his body. No sooner had he done that than he felt dozens of, he didn't know, pings from all directions and tried to figure out what they meant. Then Sirius' hand was on his left shoulder and he remembered what they were doing. "Hello, Mr. Ollivander," he said turning to his left.

"Ah, a pleasant attempt at one-uppance I haven't seen for quite some time. Welcome, welcome all," Ollivander chuckled and made his way over to behind the main counter. He was an old man, with wide pale eyes that may have been blue long ago and shined with obvious intelligence. "I presume you are here for Mister Potter and Miss Roper's wands? Let's have Miss Roper first, Mister Potter may be more complicated." Sophie stepped forward up to the counter Ollivander was behind. "Your parents' wands are a logical combination. Hm… You may be a bit more interesting though," he said as he walked back into the shelves of wands.

He returned with around a dozen wands and placed them all in front of Sophie. Twelve inches, sycamore, dragon heartstring fizzled. Eleven inches, beech and phoenix feather baulked. Thirteen and a quarter inches, blackthorn and unicorn tail hair felt dead. Ten and three-quarter inches, dogwood and phoenix was uncomfortable. Twelve and a half inches, pine, dragon was alright, "no it must be great," Ollivander had said. Thirteen inches, sycamore, phoenix was close. On the seventh wand, twelve and three-quarter inches, maple with a phoenix feather core, a rainbow of sparks came out the end of the wand and Sophie looked elated as the magic flowed between her body and the wand. Ollivander clapped excitedly before exclaiming, "Indeed, you lead an exciting lifestyle. I wish you the best."

Ollivander turned to Harry and continued, "Now your turn Mister Potter. Your parents had very different magic, finding you a wand may take some time. Though your mother already had inclinations in her magic by the time she arrived in my shop, most unusual for a muggleborn." After looking over Harry with a critical eye while the magical tape measure whirled around him, he once again retreated into the back of the shop. He returned much later with an armful of at least two dozen wands. He offered them all to Harry in sequence as they buzzed, glowed, fizzled, caused explosions, set things on fire and like with Sophie felt close but not quite. "Difficult customer indeed," Ollivander muttered as he returned with another several wands from the shelves. None of those felt quite right either. "Mister Potter, do you happen to be ambidextrous?"

"Erm, I suppose. I write and eat with my right hand, but throw and hit things with my left."

"Aha! You may be a dualist."

"But anyone can be a duelist."

"No, no child you misunderstand. Some one out of every one hundred people are ambidextrous. Half of those who are have a natural ability to channel their magic through both hands. There are some one hundred and fifty in Britain. It is usually seen when a person's magic is divided over which way to have a tendency. I should have thought with your parents, your magic would be divided, it is a near textbook case. Your mother, the charms prodigy and your father, the transfiguration expert. Any person can train themselves to wield wands in both hands, but this is natural, comparable to the colour of your hair. Nevertheless I think I have the solution." He dug through the pile and grabbed two identically designed wands, though one was a rich light coloured wood and the other was near black. "Thirteen inches with dragon heartstring cores from one dragon, hard elm and solid ebony. Hold them in one hand at the same time. Then hold one in each hand before switching to find your preference. I had thought these wands would be destined for best friends or lovers, but this is much more fitting, I think."

He delicately handed them to Harry as the rest of the group looked on in awe. When Harry grabbed them both in his right hand they emitted bright red and green with a splattering of silver sparks. Without uttering a word but with a look of rapture on his face, Harry left the elm wand in his right hand and took the ebony wand in his left. As he stood there, a blast of wind went through the shop and Harry could only say one word, "Wow!"

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	5. Remember the Name

A/N : Some of the things I've been wondering while writing this story and I'd be just ecstatic if you awesome readers answered. How is the balance between showing things versus telling? Are descriptions often enough, fulfilling, appropriate and accurate? How do you write from the perspective of an 11 year old but keep readers entertained? I find myself wanting to use fancy vocabulary no 11 year old would use, but it seems like the best word for the situation. How do you get around of having walls of text? Like huge paragraphs going on and on and on. Is the pacing of this story acceptable? Is two chapters from the beginning of summer to the end of the sorting engaging or long-winded?

A/N 2: Sirius will never ever in all eternity in any of my stories call anyone 'Pup.' Ugh.

A/N 3: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 5: Remember the Name

Silence pervaded through Ollivander's dusty shop after Harry's reaction to earning the allegiance of two wands. It was Dora though who reacted first, "now we both have something unique about us! Super totally awesometastic, high five!" Harry, used to Dora's excitability responded with a slightly more dignified though still energetic high five.

"One does not often spread the information they are a dualist," Ollivander commented. "One of the most famous recent dualists was an Unspeakable by the name 'The Count.' During the war against Grindelwald he felt his talents would be better utilised elsewhere and joined with the Hit-Wizards. Needless to say, he was highly successful but after the war disappeared into obscurity, assumedly back to the Department of Mysteries, and for decades after any proclaimed dualist was accosted with usually unwanted attention. Despite not being definite warriors, historically they are sought after by conniving forces both beneficial and damaging," followed by a look at Sirius.

"Yeah, both Voldemort and Dumbledore tried to get them on their side. No idea how successful they were overall but I do know Evan Rosier and Dorcas Meadowes were savage fighters. There was also a curse-breaker who worked for Dumbledore, older guy with the name Underhill I think."

"So what, do I only use one wand?" Harry spoke up.

"Ah no, Mr. Potter. For an extra galleon, in these cases I will varnish the lighter coloured wand to match the darker and you use the wand to which your current needs require. I recommend you take some time to familiarise yourself with the feel of the wands before returning, you will want to be capable of telling the difference," Ollivander offered.

After paying for their wands the group thanked Ollivander and made their way towards the Leaky Cauldron. The second to last shop before the exit of Diagon Alley was a stationery shop, which sold parchment, quills, ink and the like. Sirius started in surprise when he saw the shop, "Merlin! We forgot to get you guys stuff to write with. Thought the teachers would let you off homework did you?"

"Well it's not like they put it on the list of things to buy," Sophie replied.

Sarah rolled her eyes so only Andromeda could see, "it is not as if we forgot, it makes more sense to go now since it is on the way out."

"Yeah the professors would give you detention for trying that anyway," Dora interjected.

"Speaking from experience are we, Tonks?" asked Sophie. Dora only replied with a smirk.

Dora was given an unimpressed look from her mother, but the rest of the trip through the stationery shop to the Leaky Cauldron went smoothly. At the floo Ted offered to take Harry's things so he could head straight to Sirius', and soon the Tonks family was gone in three flashes of green flame. Sirius motioned for Harry to floo first, so he stepped forward and put the required sickle into the slot next to the fireplace, causing a measured portion of floo powder to fall into the flames. He took a steadying breath and stepped into the fireplace with a cry of, "12 Grimmauld Place!"

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The house on Grimmauld Place was the most central house of the Black family, and in comparison to some of the manors in the countryside was positively modern. The previous occupant, Sirius' mother, had died six years previously and while Sirius was very reluctant to do so, his grandfather Arcturus had convinced him that he was welcome to do whatever to the house that pleased him if he moved in. Consequently, Sirius began a self-education in curse-breaking to deal with the many illegal items his depraved family had stored in the house. Though there had been a few items Sirius simply couldn't understand what they were, he had moved along to tearing the house down to its framing because he couldn't stand the house maintaining its dark and sinister atmosphere.

Harry was only seven at the time, but he remembered that one day during the process Sirius had come over to the Tonks' house and was the angriest he had ever seen him. He didn't know what his godfather had talked with Andromeda and Ted about but they had been very worried after that, and he had only been told it was an adult problem. Sirius had been so much more active since then, it was like he was a different person, the scruffy and lackadaisical man became clean and vigorous, and while Harry may have spent less time with him after that the time they did spend together was way more fun. He still had no idea what happened but things had been different for him since then as well. He'd been interested in magic and read Dora's old school books despite not fully understanding some of it but now Andromeda and Sirius began teaching him certain things. Sirius would let him use his wand and teach him some spells and Andromeda taught him how to clear his mind, which he later learned was the beginning steps to learn a branch of magic called Occlumency that apparently most purebloods learned the introductory portion of before going to Hogwarts. Fortunately he was pretty good at it, he still had over two months before Hogwarts and he was ahead of Andromeda was when she went and started learning it later than she had as most purebloods simply grew up with it.

Today the house was friendly and open, the antithesis of when Sirius had grown up here, and he revelled in it. Wide windows allowed in both natural and artificial magically created light, the walls were all painted a variety of warm colours (the floo room Harry was in now was an understated blue) and though Sirius had kept the marble flooring, the rugs were all now matched with the walls of the room they were in. Anyone who knew Sirius could tell he hadn't picked any of them out himself. Sarah actually had, it was how they had met as her family owned the rug store he had gone to when he began making inquiries about how much redoing the whole house would cost. Harry hadn't seen the house before the remodel, but from Sirius' description it didn't seem a very nice place and he was glad for the change.

The other three flooed in behind him snickering over something said after he had left. "Ladies first, Harry," Sirius elaborated. Harry glared at him and cursed himself for forgetting that before heading to the kitchen, Sirius' preferred venue for conversations.

"Sirius, I finished the family history book on Friday. Do you know what's happening to the Potters soon?" Harry asked once they were seated and had something to drink, juice for him and butterbeer for Sirius.

"Uh, no. You're going to have to tell me."

"We're becoming an Ancient family, and dad wanted to use that to get on the Wizengamot," Harry explained.

"What?" Sirius yelped. "I had no idea, he never said anything. That's something he would do though, not tell people things until they were set in stone so as not to disappoint them. I guess I would've told him it was stupid to want to mess with those old crones. Heh, look at me now."

"I read my grandfather started moving things that way but knew it would take longer than he lived."

"Yeah, that'd be your grandmother Dorea's fault. She had plenty of social connections, the know how to use them and probably just saw the benefit of it for the Potters," Sirius informed him.

"Okay, but I don't know if I want to be on the Wizengamot! What if I do something stupid? Or say something wrong? Or I'm bad at politics?" Harry questioned.

"Harry, people won't expect anything from you for a long time. Maybe once you graduate Hogwarts. But look at me, I was doing stupid stuff for a long time after I was out of school but I changed and people could tell I learned to be better and they forgave me. So don't worry about it. From what I remember the Potters were in general outsiders to politics with a healthy disregard for the rules but carried themselves with presence and dignity, and I see all of those things in you. People won't expect anything different from you, if you're worried, just keep reading your book every now and again. I'm sure you'll figure it out eventually," Sirius told him firmly.

That was pretty much what Andromeda and Ted had told him. There was still one thing he was wondering, "okay. But do you think I should stay Harry?"

"Um, what?"

"It's just Harry's such a muggle name. Don't most people on the Wizengamot have fancy names? Like, like Sirius, or William and Bartholomew and Francis. I mean dad thought it would be a problem, he wanted to name me Hardwin or Henry because I'm a half-blood already and the purebloods don't like muggle things it'd be harder for me to be respected," Harry clarified.

"I'm guessing Lily stuck her heels in and wouldn't budge?" Harry nodded, that exactly had happened. "She could be a bit ridiculous about things, even on the rare occasion she was wrong. Anyway, you can't, in the magical world you have to have both parents to allow you to change your name," Sirius said as he stared at the wall without seeing.

Harry was slightly upset and relieved at the same time upon learning that, "Thanks Sirius. Do you think I could get my mum's second year journal soon? I know I should have thought about it when we went to Gringotts to get my money for Hogwarts supplies, but I was just too excited."

"Sure thing just not next weekend, Sarah's dragging me to a bunch of places across the continent to figure out where we want to get food for the wedding. International portkeys, blech. Remind me sometime after then. How much money do you have left?"

"Er, something like 7 galleons. Not like I spend much, though."

"Yeah alright. Let's go find the womenfolk," Sirius said, and with a motion that belied extensive experience, tossed his now drained butterbeer into the bin from halfway across the room.

Harry and Sirius found Sarah and Sophie in the main living room, an airy and tastefully decorated room, making light conversation which they joined in while Sophie was drawing something in her sketchbook she brought with her nearly everywhere. She claimed you never knew when you were going to be bored enough to start randomly drawing or find something worth drawing. While Sophie did draw a lot, everyone who knew her knew her favourite type of art was painting but it was much harder to carry around and bring places. Her love for art developed due to being the youngest child in a family whose beliefs she didn't quite understand, caused by being more emotionally close to her open-minded aunt than parents, which in turn caused her to spend much time by herself and painted to pass the time.

Dinner that night was a simple affair, while all four of them had 'proper manners' forced onto them from an early age, they all knew it didn't need to be respected in current company. Sirius' house elf, he had one because he had tried to cook earlier in his life and miserably failed, cooked a variety of homely dishes and conversation flowed among the diners. "You know, now that you have wands Remus would be happy to tutor you two on a regular schedule multiple times a week, rather than once every few weeks giving you impromptu lessons like he has been. We all know the DADA position is cursed and can't be fixed, so learning some self-defense before going to Hogwarts would be a good idea," Sirius pointed out.

"Though I will say whoever is teaching this year did pick a good book," Sarah told them.

"Really? Good to know if we have a bad teacher the book will still help. When can we start?" Harry asked.

"Probably this week, I'll owl him after you guys leave. He'll be enthusiastic to have more students to tutor, I think he only has four or five this summer," Sirius responded.

"Knowing Remus he already planned to tutor Harry and Sophie and that's why he has fewer students," Sarah mentioned.

"Yeah, you're right about that. Anyway you two can floo over here in the evenings after work and dinner and we'll have the lessons here, it'll be easier that way. You'll be ready to take on Hogwarts in no time."

"Speaking of being ready for Hogwarts, Harry are you going to take the eyesight corrective potion? I know some people consider it not worth the hassle to take every time your eyesight changes, and all the charms you can put on glasses are nice, where do you stand?" Sarah inquired.

"Aunt Andy said it's best to wait as long as possible. I will take it though, just probably a week before school. Hopefully I won't have to take it again before next summer, she said it wasn't a very fun potion to take."

After dinner Sophie and Sarah flooed off to her parents' house, leaving Harry and Sirius to listen to a quidditch match between the Appleby Arrows and Puddlemere United. Sirius always bemoaned how Quidditch matches could be watched live with magic like muggles watched football, but the stadium owners always worked to prevent it every time someone proposed the idea to make more money. Hours later after an Appleby win, Harry flooed home himself, looking forward to leaving for Hogwarts more than ever.

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Harry was ready to leave for King's Cross station long before everyone else and he couldn't help but be excited for the year to come, attending magic school in a magical castle had to be one of the coolest things ever. The previous summer had also been incredibly busy between three tutoring sessions a week from Remus, planning and pulling off Sirius' wedding, Dora beginning Auror training ten hours a day five days a week and then there was the whole debacle when Dora had bought a motorcycle like Sirius had when he graduated. That had resulted in several shouting matches and Dora sleeping at Sirius' house for as many nights but eventually Andromeda and Ted had conceded she was an adult now and would make her own decisions. Both Harry and Dora both explicitly didn't mention how many times Sirius had taken them on his bike or that he had taught Dora how to drive it after her fifth year.

Despite the tireless summer, Harry felt few students were as well prepared to attend Hogwarts as he was. Stories told to him by Sirius of his and Harry's father's antics during school revealed many secrets about the school, and in addition to that he had been given a magical map of the school, the Marauder's Map, passed on from Dora for his birthday. The map had aided in and exacerbated Dora's troublemaking tendencies, causing her parents no small amount of distress but Harry would always be incredibly grateful for it, because in September of her third year she had found the man who had betrayed his parent's location to Voldemort's followers and he was now rightfully rotting in Azkaban. Remus' lessons had given him a wide supply of knowledge, so even though he doubted he would get in a situation he would need it, he could defend himself. Also, Dora had taught him the Howler neutralising spell since Sirius had a habit of sending them for no particular reason. Finally he knew if he had any questions the owl he had been given for his birthday by Andromeda and Ted would be perfectly happy to deliver letters. She was an odd owl, very intelligent with a definite personality, she had refused to adopt any names he had suggested until he had been flipping through his History of Magic book reading off names and deemed herself Hedwig, and even further her snowy white coloring was unique, Andromeda said she had only ever seen one other owl like her.

An hour and a half later found Harry, the Tonks family and Sirius on Platform 9¾ next to the scarlet Hogwarts Express with two families he wasn't very fond of. The Ropers including Sophie's parents and two older brothers Aaron and Timothy, who were starting their sixth and fifth years respectively, and Sarah, now Sarah Black. Besides Sophie and Sarah, Harry thought they were all people he didn't want to be friendly with but they weren't as bad as the other family they were with. The Malfoys were, in Harry's opinion, decidedly mean and though he had seen them be _nice_ it didn't mean they were good people, as the parents took great effort to avoid the Tonks family and their son Draco openly sneered at them, while playing nice with Sirius and the Ropers. Sirius had told Harry before they left it was a show of solidarity in the Black family, since he had finally finished clearing out all the cursed objects on Black family properties he was going to try to get some legislation pushed through the Wizengamot regarding cursed objects later this month and he wanted to have as strong a position as possible.

After some time, Ted finally broke the polite conversation. "Why don't we get all your trunks into a compartment on the train?"

Lucius Malfoy frowned at him, glanced at Harry, and proclaimed, "I'm sure Draco arranged to spend time with his own friends."

"Yes but it's best if they all start the journey together, after the train leaves the station he can find his friends," Sirius stated. Narcissa noticeably grabbed Lucius' hand in a move to quell any protest he may have made, allowing Lucius, Mr. Roper and Sirius to levitate a trunk each and to disappear onto the train, followed by the three eleven year olds.

After extensive goodbyes, promising Andromeda and Ted he would never cause as much trouble as Dora had and promising to keep in touch with Sirius, Harry carried his owl and rucksack containing things to keep him entertained during the ride onto the train. He plopped down in a seat in their chosen compartment next to the window, across from Sophie who was already leaning out of the window waving to the families. He looked out the window and sincerely wished his parents were there seeing him off, maybe he would have a few brothers or sisters too. But he was grateful for what he had, so he joined Sophie in the window waving goodbye to the Tonks and Blacks until the train lurched and began gaining speed rapidly, soon they turned a corner and the platform was out of sight. The two of them sat down and only then noticed Draco Malfoy pouting on the far side of the compartment, looking decidedly unhappy being there.

"Well, prince of poncedom, are you gracing us with your presence much longer?" Sophie quipped.

Draco scowled at her, "As a matter of fact, no. Father has given me important instructions to find Longbottom and be friends with him. More than either of you can say about yourselves. Crabbe and Goyle will come of course." Harry wondered if Lucius was aware what the show on the platform had been for, but refrained from saying anything.

"I saw him with your future best friend earlier Malfoy, a Weasley," Sophie told him helpfully.

"Ugh, why? They're nasty blood-traitors, they deserve being as poor as they are."

"Nasty? I don't think so. They are poor, but that's your family's fault. Forcing them out of business and losing them their Wizengamot seat, I imagine the majority of people feel sorry for them."

"Yes well, they let it happen, didn't they?" Malfoy asked as he left the compartment.

"What happened?" Harry asked Sophie.

"Well it's like I said, around a hundred years ago the Malfoys and Weasleys were competing family businesses when the Weasley's business went up in flames destroying everything inside, including all related knowledge and killing a few members of the family, effectively stopping them from carrying out business, and though they were never caught the Malfoys were highly suspected. Literally the next Wizengamot session Nicholas Malfoy declared they were no longer fit to serve the country, and through some backhanded deals they were voted out. That's why today seats are for life or until resignation, no one wanted that to happen to them," she explained.

"Wow that's brutal. His mum's a Black too. The Weasley parents were both affected by being disowned from the family, Mr. Weasley's mum and Mrs. Weasley herself were disowned for marrying blood-traitors. Malfoy's just asking for trouble. Oh well," he shrugged. Harry and Sophie settled in for the ride, him reading a Quidditch Quarterly magazine and her drawing again.

"What're you going to draw?" Harry asked.

"The platform. I guess it would be nice to have a memory of it," she replied.

The train ride progressed through towns and open spaces, with the countryside outside progressing from fields full of cows to woods, twisting rivers and dark greens hills and the towns becoming fewer and farther in between. Three hours into the ride, they were disrupted by a smiling, dimpled woman pushing a cart selling treats from which Harry bought two cauldron cakes and pumpkin pasties for Sophie and himself. They briefly talked about what house they thought they were going to be in but concluded it didn't matter. Harry knew and liked adults from each house so he didn't much care, and though he knew he was a parselmouth he wasn't from the Slytherin line according to both his mum's journals and Sirius. Sophie was hoping for Ravenclaw like her aunt or Slytherin like the rest of her family.

They were already dressed in their robes, so as the sky darkened and the nature out of their window grew increasingly wild, and a prefect visited telling them it was time to change he didn't wait for them to respond and merely gave them a nod before moving on. Soon after, the train began slowing and a voice rang through the train saying, "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train, it will be taken to the school separately." Harry made eye contact with Sophie and nodded, both of them knew this was it, what they had been looking forward to for years.

As the two of them exited the train into the cold night air among a mass of students all older than themselves, a lantern being held by an enormous man was travelling along the platform accompanied by a deep voice ringing out, "Firs' years! Firs' years over here! Gather 'round firs' years!"

Once the large group of first years were the only ones on the platform save a few straggling older students, the big man told them to follow him, they were taking boats across the lake to the castle and no more than four of them to a boat. Harry and Sophie hopped in a boat and were joined by a dark skinned boy and a girl with very bushy hair, both of them looking around and trying to take everything in.

When they were all in a boat, the man shouted "everyone in? Right then - FORWARD!" The boats jerked forward and moved across the harbour placidly, and as they neared the edge of it he called out once again, "yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec, jus' round this corner here."

There it was, perched atop a high cliff across the lake was a tall and imposing castle, with its windows sparkling along the stars in the sky and several towers and turrets adding to the image. Everyone stayed silent in awe as they glided across the lake, approaching the near side of the cliff and a barely visible tunnel hidden by hanging ivy they had to duck under. Reaching another harbour the boats docked themselves, which they promptly climbed out of and headed up a passageway that came out onto smooth, damp grass right in front of the castle.

"Everyone here?" The man, who had yet to introduce himself, asked and raised a huge fist and knocked three times on the gigantic castle door.

The door swung open immediately, revealing a tall black-haired witch in emerald green robes standing there stock straight and a stern expression on her face. Professor McGonagall, Harry thought to himself as he recognised her from what Sirius had told him, she definitely looked like someone not to cross lightly. Though knowing his father and his friends had done so regularly ruined the effect somewhat.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," the large man declared.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here." Huh, Hagrid was his name. Harry recognised that name, but he couldn't remember from where exactly at the moment.

Professor McGonagall opened the door all the way and motioned for them to follow her through the expansive Entrance Hall past a set of doors that sounded as if they concealed hundreds of voices and into a small empty chamber just towards the end of the hall. Jamming themselves all in, the first years looked around and fidgeted nervously as McGonagall introduced them to the four houses they would be sorted into before the start-of-term feast and told them to straighten up before she returned. There was some murmuring going on throughout the room, the bushy haired girl who'd shared the boat across the lake with them was running through a list of spells rather loudly in comparison, causing those around her to shoot her annoyed looks. There was a commotion in the front of the room accompanied by raised voices, though Harry couldn't tell what was being said. Standing on his tiptoes, he saw Malfoy and two large boys facing off with Longbottom, the Boy-Who-Lived, and a Weasley.

"Looks like Malfoy got on as well with Weasley as we thought," he said to Sophie, who snorted softly and opened her mouth to comment, but several spectral forms burst through the walls at that moment startling the group of students and ending the argument occurring at the front of the room. Some of the ghosts introduced themselves before Professor McGonagall returned and ushered them along to the feast. She had them form a line and follow her out of the chamber. Feeling like his shoes were now made of stone, Harry got into line behind Sophie and in front of some sandy haired boy, and they walked through the double doors of the Great Hall.

The sight he was greeted with was breathtaking, much like seeing the castle across the lake earlier, the Great Hall was a strange and splendid place. Thousands of candles floated above four long tables where the remaining students were sitting. The tables were all laid out with glinting golden plates and goblets, and the silverware looked like real silver. Harry briefly wondered what Remus did when he went to school, before resuming his observation, eyes landing on a long table perpendicular to the student tables where the teachers were seated. McGonagall led them to line up in front of this table and told them they would be called to be sorted momentarily. There was a lull in the sound during which Harry glanced at the ceiling he'd heard about plenty of times, and not only did it live up to his expectations it exceeded them. It was one thing having the castle and Great Hall described to him, but seeing it was a whole different thing. Harry jerked his head down when he heard a gravelly voice began singing and saw a hat on a stool before them was the source.

The whole hall applauded when the hat finished its song describing the four Hogwarts houses and how they were to be sorted while it bowed to each of the four houses. Professor McGonagall began reading off student's names, some of which Harry recognised and others not at all, and they would step forward facing the entire student body to sit upon the stool and have the Sorting Hat placed upon their head. Once they were sorted their new house would cheer and clap to greet them while the new student joined them.

Suddenly, "Potter, Harry," was called and he startled, Sophie bumped her shoulder against his arm in support and Harry stepped forward promising himself that no matter what happened the magical world would remember his name.

The hat dropped over his eyes as Harry stared out over the students. Then he heard a voice inside his mind. "Hmm. Difficult. Not Hufflepuff, I can tell. No. A thirst to prove yourself. Make them remember your name indeed. Not a bad mind. So much talent, yes, and my goodness a dual wielder, Godric himself was one, though he preferred to use one wand and a sword. You could be great, you know. Well, Mr. Potter? Any choice?"

'Erm, no not really. Where will I be the best? I guess,' he thought in his mind.

"Quite. You will find out interesting things, Mr. Potter, in … SLYTHERIN!" The hat called to the hall.

The table on the far right of the hall clapped for him as he walked over to join them feeling relieved, and he found a seat near a small blonde haired girl sorted near the beginning, Davis was her last name he thought, with a seat open next to him in case Sophie got sorted into the house as well. He couldn't wait to tell Andromeda he was in her old house, she had never given up calling it the best house of Hogwarts. Two students later, after an Oliver Rivers was sorted into Hufflepuff, Sophie was sitting on the stool being sorted. She was on the stool slightly longer than Harry before the hat proclaimed her a Slytherin and she came over, sitting next to Harry as they shared a big smile.

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	6. Touch the Sky

A/N: I wanted this chapter to also cover the first two weeks of school or so but I finally got around to watching Rogue One last weekend. What a movie! I liked it a lot, though the pacing at the beginning was weird as it felt slow but actually so much was happening. Anyway, I spent a decent amount of time nerding out on Star Wars instead of writing. Thus, the sacrifice of only a 3,500 word chapter for regular uploads.

A/N 2: I'm not ignorant to the fact Harry Potter takes place in Britain, so if any of you wicked Brits see something and think ' _that's so American it's revolting_ ' shoot me a message or review or something.

A/N 3: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly. Dumbledore's speech at the opening feast is quoted from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, it didn't seem appropriate to paraphrase or change.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 6: Touch the Sky

Since there were only three students to be sorted after Sophie the ceremony concluded quickly, with a girl going to Ravenclaw, the Weasley boy, Ronald, going to Gryffindor and another boy joining Slytherin, sitting with Malfoy and some other purebloods Harry recognised. Professor McGonagall promptly rolled up her scroll of names and took the stool and Sorting Hat away while Albus Dumbledore made to stand before the hall of students. The elderly man gave off an impression of great energy and immense happiness, as if beginning the school year gave him a new purpose in life.

"Welcome!" he said. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you!"

He sat back down and everyone clapped and cheered, though Harry, whose back was to the wall and could see the whole hall, noticed the Slytherin and Ravenclaw tables were more reserved than Hufflepuff and Gryffindor. Harry didn't know how he felt about the Headmaster, though he regarded him as overall a good man sometimes Sirius would complain he was making his life much harder in the Wizengamot. Sirius also said that Professor Dumbledore was maybe not the best person to run Hogwarts, because while he did do a good job he was such a political figure it made the school open to political problems.

A wave of food smells crashed against Harry's nose accompanied by a rise in the volume throughout the Great Hall, the Welcoming Feast had begun. The hall echoed with talk, laughter and the clatter of knives and forks as most of the students reacquainted themselves with each other and the castle after months away, and the new students introduced themselves. Harry introduced himself to the girl he had sat next to, Tracey Davis he learned, and she was rather friendly.

"I can't wait to begin learning. I hope they start straight away," she professed to Harry. "Mother and Father had our library warded so I couldn't go in, and only gave me books they wanted me to have. I didn't even get my school books and my wand until last week! I bet most in our year are way ahead of me."

"What did you do growing up? Surely you had to have some school."

"Oh yes, I was tutored in arithmetic, writing and such but it was terribly boring. The only useful thing I learned was to mingle with foreign officials since my father is the ambassador to the NEWP," she explained.

"The newp?" a student, who looked only slightly older, near them asked.

"The Northern European Wizarding Partnership, in English at least. Since there aren't as many wizards they got together and have a big ministry for magic over multiple muggle countries, like our ministry and Ireland. Don't they teach that here? It's been very active lately. The muggles are having some big transition going on and my parents are very involved, it's been very busy recently," Tracey explained.

"We only learn British history for the first few years," the boy answered. "Don't worry, you'll learn plenty though. Even with my family teaching me before Hogwarts the classes were interesting, and the library," he sighed contentedly, "is absolutely the best with books on anything you could imagine."

"Can you show me? I'm ever so ready to begin classes" Tracey asked.

"Sure, in between classes and dinner tomorrow would be a good time. I'm Dylan, Bartholomew Dylan Jr. exactly, though my friends call me Barry. I hope to make your acquaintance during your time at school," he said extending his hand in greeting to her.

The rest of the meal passed easily, smoothly flowing from the main course to desserts of all designs, Harry particularly enjoyed the treacle tart. The ghosts also showed up sometime during the meal, and Harry recognised several from the chamber before the sorting, including the Slytherin ghost that was haunting the table.

"The Bloody Baron definitely deserves his name," he mentioned to Sophie, as the ghost sat next to an unhappy looking Draco Malfoy.

"No, really?" she replied, but Harry's attention had been drawn elsewhere.

Up at the High Table with the teachers a teacher with greasy black hair, a hooked nose and sallow skin was looking at him with a weird look, somewhere between deep thought and disgust. He immediately recognised him as Severus Snape, the Potions professor and one of Sirius' least favourite people. Harry thought he knew what was causing that look, between his parents and godfather Harry was the child of his best friend and worst enemies. His mother had said Severus was a stiff and awkward child but ultimately her best friend, at least through second year from what he had read in his mother's diary. Sirius had said they went their separate ways in fifth year and he became a Death Eater after that, though allegedly he was a spy for Professor Dumbledore, even if Sirius wasn't so sure.

The next seat down the table though the teacher he was talking to was giving him interested glances, and Harry didn't know what to make of it. Was Snape saying good or bad things about him? "Hey Dylan, who's that teacher with the turban talking to Professor Snape?" he asked.

"You know Professor Snape already? That's good, he's Head of Slytherin House. I don't know who that is, probably the new Defense teacher though as I don't see any other new faces," he told Harry.

Noticing the students looking at them the two teachers turned their attention elsewhere, but Harry watched them for a while even if they never looked back at him.

Finally, the desserts disappeared from the tables leaving the tableware as sparkling clean as before anyone began eating and Professor Dumbledore once again stood to address the students while the hall fell silent.

"Ahem - just a few more words now we are all fed and watered. I have a few start-of-term notices to give you. First years should note that the forest in the grounds is forbidden to all pupils. And a few of our older students would do well to remember that as well." Dumbledore's eyes glanced towards the Gryffindor table and Harry knew from Sirius' stories that the Marauders had explored the forest extensively, apparently someone was continuing the tradition. "I have also been asked by Mr. Filch, the caretaker, to remind you all that no magic should be used between classes in the corridors. Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of term. Anyone interested in playing for their house teams should contact Madam Hooch. And finally, I must tell you that this year, the third-floor corridor on the right hand side is out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a very painful death."

Harry along with the majority of students in the hall stared at the Headmaster incredulously, surely he was not serious. Somehow Harry thought he was, and suddenly a connection was made in his mind, Gringotts had been broken into at the end of July sending the majority of the wizarding world into a momentary panic but nothing had been stolen. Was what had attempted to be stolen now being guarded at Hogwarts? Harry couldn't decide whether it was absolutely brilliant, whoever was trying to steal it would have to avoid all the prying eyes of students and teachers in addition to Hogwarts already being one of the safest places in Britain, or it was completely ridiculous hiding something that could attract dangerous people in a school. He barely noticed Dumbledore conjure up a ribbon with words on it and begin the school song until the entire Great Hall exploded in sound as hundreds of voices started singing. Harry didn't know what was going on, but it seemed like everyone was doing it so he joined in about halfway through.

As the students began leaving the hall seeking the comfort of their common rooms and beds two older students with badges on their robes were moving along the Slytherin table and speaking to all the first years telling them to follow as they led them to the common room. The eleven first years followed the prefects out of the hall and into the dungeons.

"Hogwarts castle has ten primary levels, seven at and above ground level and three subterranean usually referred to as the dungeons. You'll have plenty of time to explore the rest of the castle, but it's a good idea to familiarise yourself with the dungeons first because that is where our dormitories are. The Slytherin common room has remained undiscovered for over seven hundred years, Magic forbid you to be the one to reveal the secret. Therefore you'll want to quickly learn how to not be followed in the dungeons, like we are right now!" the female prefect announced, launching a nonverbal spell over all of the first years' heads.

A pair of yellow spells were returned, one hitting a first year and another hitting the wall harmlessly. The first year, a lanky boy with brown hair, squawked in alarm as his shoes transformed into bananas. Harry was mildly interested, ever the prankster Sirius would really appreciate that spell, but figured he'd probably want to help his fellow student. He withdrew his elm wand from its sleeve, since it was better with charms, and sent a quick " _finite incantatem_ " at the boy's shoes, which had become a squishy gross mess, allowing them to revert them to their original state. He was glad Remus had taught him that spell, it had proven useful to know. The boy nodded his thanks.

"Ugh, the Weasley twins. They're definitely worth watching out for, they enjoy causing trouble for its own sake. Good on you for knowing the counter, that's a second year spell. We'll make our way to the common room quickly and finish talking there," the male prefect told them, returning his wand to his pocket as he had been posed ready to defend against any other spells coming their way, and headed off deeper into the dungeons motioning for the group to follow him.

After they had gone a very long way from the Great Hall and gone down three separate flights of stairs the prefects stopped in front of an expanse of brick wall that looked cleaner and less damp than the rest of the hall they were in. The girl leant into it whispering something quietly and Harry couldn't understand what she said but he was distracted from that as the section of wall split in two, collapsing to the sides much like the entrance to Diagon Alley did. They filed into the room which was filled with many other students spread throughout and all talking ceased when the door closed behind them.

As the two prefects situated themselves in front of the first years with four others, seemingly prefects from the badges on their robes, Harry took a moment to look around the room. The Slytherin common room was a long, low room with a wall hewn straight into the stone on his right hand side. Although the ceiling looked to be made of rudimentary bricks much like the majority of the castle, with round greenish lamps hung from it on chains. There were a significant number of chairs and couches placed in convenient alignments for activities such as socialising, studying or sequestering oneself. It seemed the most coveted seats were around the two mantelpieces with crackling fires in them on opposite sides of the room, one close to the entrance and another on the other side of two staircases on the right side of the room. The most striking feature though was the large glass wall to Harry's left looking out into what appeared to be water since it was darker than any sky should be, Harry couldn't be sure but he figured they could be deep enough under the castle for the lake to be on the other side. Fortunately, the prefects allowed them the time to look around before they spoke up.

The female prefect who had led them down to the common room spoke. "Congratulations! I'm sixth year Prefect Gemma Farley, and I'm delighted to welcome you to Slytherin House. Our emblem is the serpent, the wisest of creatures, our house colours are emerald green and silver and our common room lies behind a concealed entrance down in the dungeons. As you'll see, its window looks out into the depths of the Hogwarts lake. We often see the giant squid swooshing by, and sometimes more interesting creatures. We like to feel that our hangout has the aura of a mysterious, underwater shipwreck.

"Now, there are a few things you should know about Slytherin, and a few you should forget. Firstly, let's dispel a few myths. You might have heard rumours about Slytherin house, that we're all into the Dark Arts, and will only talk to you if your great-grandfather was a famous wizard, and rubbish like that. Well, you don't want to believe everything you hear from competing houses. I'm not denying that we've produced our share of Dark wizards, but so have the other three houses, they just don't like admitting it. And yes, we have traditionally tended to take students who come from long lines of witches and wizards, but nowadays you'll find plenty of people in Slytherin house who have at least one Muggle great-grandparent. Here's a little-known fact that the other three houses don't bring up much: Merlin was a Slytherin. Yes, Merlin himself, the most famous wizard in history! He learned all he knew in this very house! Do you want to follow in the footsteps of Merlin? Or would you rather sit at the old desk of that illustrious ex-Hufflepuff, Eglantine Puffett, inventor of the Self-Soaping Dishcloth? I didn't think so.

"But that's enough about what we're not. Let's talk about what we are, which is the coolest and edgiest house in this school. We play to win, because we care about the honour and traditions of Slytherin. We also get respect from our fellow students. Yes, some of that respect might be tinged with fear, because of our Dark reputation, but you know what? It can be fun, having a reputation for walking on the wild side. Chuck out a few hints that you've got access to a whole library of curses, and see whether anyone feels like nicking your quills. But we're not bad people. We're like our emblem the snake, sleek, powerful, and frequently misunderstood."

Then her male companion continued. "I'm Romulus Rosier, sixth year Prefect. You know what Salazar Slytherin looked for in his chosen students? The seeds of greatness. You've been chosen by this house because you've got the potential to be great, in the true sense of the word. All right, you might see a couple of people hanging around the common room whom you might not think are destined for anything special. Well, keep that to yourself. If the Sorting Hat put them in here, there's something great about them, and don't you forget it.

"Now, two important things for you to know. First, the office of the Slytherin Head of House has an anonymous drop-box where you can bring to Professor Snape's attention any nonessential concerns, questions or thoughts you have. Think of it as sending him an owl without the owl, if the Professor thinks it's important he will deal with it. Secondly, when in the presence of other houses Slytherins always keep a unified front. Once you are in the common room or your dormitories you are free to dispute. If you can't settle something with your words then Slytherin has a tradition that's just another reason it's the best house, you can have a sanctioned duel. It has to be approved and refereed by Professor Snape, which you will arrange through the drop-box I just told you about. The duelling platform is on the level above the lower year dormitories and locked unless in use. I've found the duelling quite useful in my years in Slytherin, and you'll never know when you'll need it once you graduate.

"A few more things you might need to know. Our house ghost is the Bloody Baron. If you get on the right side of him he'll sometimes agree to frighten people for you. Just don't ask him how he got bloodstained, he doesn't like it. The password to the common room changes every fortnight. Keep an eye on the noticeboard. Never bring anyone from another house to our common room or tell them our password. Like Farley said earlier, no outsider has entered it for more than seven centuries.

"Well, I think that's all for now. I'm sure you'll like our dormitories. Though you'll be sharing a bathroom with your year-mates everyone gets their own room to sleep in, furnished with ancient four-posters with green silk hangings, and bedspreads embroidered with silver thread. Medieval tapestries depicting the adventures of famous Slytherins cover the walls, and silver lanterns hang from the ceilings. You'll sleep well, it's very soothing listening to the lake water lapping against the castle right below your window. The first through fourth years are on the second level, and we highly recommend not disturbing the upper years in their dormitories, try to find someone in the common room or Professor Snape in his office if you must. Boys are the staircase further away from the entrance, girls are the closer one. You are expected at breakfast no later than 7:30, while classes may not begin for first and second years until 9:45 the remainder of the school begins at 8:30, you'll want to be there to receive your class schedules and ask any questions you may have."

While the prefects were making their speech Harry had been enthralled by their words, this was what he wanted from his house at Hogwarts and it seemed like the sky was the limit. Admittedly he didn't quite believe that no one cared he was a half-blood like Farley had said, but maybe things had changed since Andromeda had been in Slytherin and she had failed to mention the personal rooms and duelling, maybe those were some type of house secret. Looking over at Sophie to see what she thought of the introduction speech but she was looking incredibly distracted, shooting apprehensive and somewhat scared glances at the window into the lake. Seeing his eyes on her, she only shook her head and made a beeline for the stairs leading to the dormitories. Figuring he'd figure out what was bothering her later and feeling fairly tired himself, Harry followed the rest of the boys in his year heading to the stairs on the left and up two levels, ending up in a hallway with four doors with years one through four labelled on them.

Going through the door farthest down the hall Harry found himself in a chamber resembling a reception room with seven other doors, six opposite the entrance with their last names and an initial of their first names, and the seventh on the left side of the room with the word bathroom on it. Harry's room was the second closest to the bathroom, between Zabini B. and Nott T. Overall he felt he could definitely get used to these surroundings. Since all the other boys seemed to know each other and Harry only knew Malfoy there was an awkward moment before introductions were exchanged. Harry learned the boy he'd helped earlier was Theodore Nott and decidedly reserved, Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle were two large and not particularly bright boys and Blaise Zabini was confrontationally disdainful. Checking the bathroom and finding it quite adequate, he went to his room.

The room was furnished exactly as Rosier the prefect had described it, with the sole exception of a small table at the side of the bed below the window, it was barely large enough to do homework but quite adequate to write a letter. The left side of his room was taken up by a massive tapestry depicting a wizard facing off against a massive sea serpent, the bottom said ' _Glanmore Peakes Defeats the Sea Serpent of Cromer, c. 1712_.' The window had a glass pane that could be opened but what surprised Harry was his owl was outside waiting for him! She really was very smart, Harry couldn't wait to write Andromeda, Ted, Dora and Sirius and tell them how happy he was about being sorted into Slytherin. Letting her in Harry looked around and noticed his trunk along the wall by his bed. With a happy sigh, Harry settled into his room for the next year, spreading his belongings in organised sets throughout the room and writing a set of letters to send off to his family.

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	7. Never Enough

A/N : The end two paragraphs of last chapter was a disaster. Both its formatting and grammar, so I apologise. I usually write the majority of the chapter and then finish it on Friday right before posting it. If you're back after that, thank you for believing in me!

A/N 2: Something is wrong with this chapter. I don't know what. Is it the way I order things? Do I go into too much detail about things? Is there not enough dialogue? Look, I have no clue, but if you do please drop me a message or leave a review. I'll fix it. Thanks, you beautiful people.

A/N 3: If anyone is going to be a drumplefrumple and complain about wandless magic, take it up with J.K herself. She had Tom Riddle and Lily doing it well before Hogwarts. Though Harry isn't up to that level, just know he could be.

A/N 4: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 7: Never Enough

Despite being enthusiastic about his Hogwarts house Harry quickly realised everything would not be a walk in the park. Case in point, early the first morning when Harry exited his room to shower he was met with the distinctive smell of dungbombs in the entry room. Considering this prank was a relatively tame one Harry had extensive experience with due to Sirius, he continued with his morning knowing the best way to deal with the smell was to leave the area and cast a cleaning charm. Later Harry learned his roommates' actual rooms had been hit as well, and he was glad he had cast the protective charms on his door he knew from protecting himself from Sirius and Dora over the summer.

"You have a wand now, you can defend yourself. It's open season!" Sirius had declared, and Harry was forced to learn the Locking Charm and more importantly, though it was incredibly difficult, the Imperturbable Charm so they didn't stick any number of things, from dungbombs to Dr. Filibuster's Fabulous Wet-Start No Heat Fireworks, through the crack under his bedroom door.

"The older Slytherins do this every year, father told me," Malfoy said. "It makes us all be friends. As if." The last of his statement said while looking straight at Harry, who didn't particularly care to be friends with Malfoy either and only shrugged while leaving the dormitory on his way to breakfast.

He kept the fact that he knew how to defend himself against the prank from his roommates, they'd probably be mad at him or jealous or something. In his mother's journals she had talked about the difficulty of being muggleborn and the prejudice she was treated with by certain students from Slytherin, which had only been exacerbated by her apparently instinctive grasp on magic. Being a half-blood with a muggleborn mother was just as bad in the minds of the bigots, he'd been told, and he wondered how they would react to his incredibly advanced, for his age at least, magical ability. It was amusing though, watching Malfoy and Blaise fuss over removing the smell from themselves. He would defend the main door tonight, he just wouldn't tell anyone.

A factor for the reason he was so far ahead of his classmates was he had read all of Dora's old school books. When he had gotten his wands at the beginning of summer he'd spent hours on end holed up in his bedroom performing every spell he found. Another factor was Remus' expansive tutoring both Sophie and himself had received, learning a great deal of subjects from him. Broad magical theory that covered his knowledge of how magic worked and feeling magic, something Harry was intrinsically good at and had inherited from his mother according to Remus. Spells that were good to know but wouldn't be found in a school book, like the Alarm Charm which could wake a person up at a certain time. Lastly, he taught them self-defense.

Considering the yearly turnover of Defense teachers at Hogwarts nobody knew what they would learn so Remus made sure they could adequately cast a sufficient list of offensive and defensive spells. The most exciting part of these lessons was towards the end of summer when they'd been allowed to participate in mock duels, both with Sophie and Harry against each other and against an adult. Although Sophie was no slouch, Harry proved to be the better duelist of the two, even while only using one wand as Remus had told him he'd want to get used to it and only use both when he absolutely had to. At the moment it was a difficult decision which wand was better for duelling, the elm wand excelled at a wide variety of magics while his ebony wand specialized in specifically combative magic, however Harry knew the ebony wand was a better transfiguration wand and once he was proficient enough with transfiguration to use it in a duel it would be immensely useful.

The final and most important factor in Harry's drive to learn magic was his parents. Both of them had been uncommonly gifted with magic and Harry was no different himself, except he wanted to be even better to honour their memory, to be the best, the most impressive and the most powerful wizard he could become. Growing up hearing the stories of Lily and James' achievements left a deep feeling of hollowness within him, he was almost never satisfied with his accomplishments, but when he did something he knew would impress his parents a minute portion of that feeling went away.

Sirius had told him how his father hadn't learned anything in Transfiguration until fourth year and breezed through the majority of his classes with ease. His mother, on the other hand, was in a world of her own, slightly obvious considering she had earned a Charms Mastery at nineteen years old, as Harry found on his tenth birthday when Sirius had given him his family's history book and Lily's personal diary from her first year at Hogwarts. Some of the things she had gone through, like learning her dad wasn't actually her father and dealing with being a muggleborn at Hogwarts, were difficult to read and Harry sympathised with the emotional time she went through. But her magical prowess was ridiculous, by the end of her first year his mother had finished studying and could perform all the second year Charms and Potions material, and Harry had all of her notes from not only those subjects but everything, up to and including how to reverse the pranks his father and friends had executed.

So it came as little surprise when classes for Harry were unfortunately incredibly boring, in hindsight learning as much as he had before coming to Hogwarts would have inevitably ended up with this result. In Charms, Transfiguration and Defense Against the Dark Arts, the classes Harry was particularly interested in, he could already perform every spell they'd be required to learn for first year and had been starting to learn the second year material on his own. Even if in Charms and Transfiguration he used his off hand it only taught him how to channel magic especially fluidly. His other classes, Potions, History of Magic and Herbology, didn't hold much interest for him so he slogged through them with appropriate diligence. He may not have enjoyed them but that didn't matter, he wanted to make his parents proud, and part of that was being top of his class just as his mother was.

His teachers as well didn't give the impression they had expected anything different. In Charms the half-goblin Professor Flitwick applauded him on inheriting his mother's skills and to keep up the good work, Professor McGonagall looked teary-eyed and sniffed while telling him his father would be proud when he changed his matchstick into a needle on his second try and Professor Snape watched him in an evaluating manner over the two Potions classes they had the first week, an improvement over the welcoming feast.

Their reasoning may have been different but Harry quickly discovered that much of the remainder of the school didn't treat him much better than the older year Slytherins. The Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs often regarded him and his housemates with varying levels of disdain, while Ravenclaws kept to themselves. Harry was okay with that, he'd been an outsider most of his life in some way or another, despite the efforts of the adults in his life sometimes they even made it even more apparent without meaning to. As long as the other houses left him well enough alone that was fine and if they tried to prank him, or attack but he really doubted that would happen, he'd learned the signs and feel of the magic of a prank about to commence and he knew he could get the upper hand on almost anyone. Except for Remus, the sneaky bugger.

The other houses attitudes towards the Slytherins were not unjustly founded though. In fact before their very first class, Potions with the Gryffindors on Monday morning, Harry learned that Malfoy had already pitted himself and his friends against the Gryffindors, Neville Longbottom and Ron Weasley to be exact, not surprising considering how they had interacted the previous night before the sorting.

"Father told me Professor Snape has been instructed by Dumbledore himself to be easy with Longbottom. I hope he's twice as harsh with the rest of the Gryffindors," Malfoy said to his group of friends outside of the classroom.

"Whatever do you mean Draco?" Pansy Parkinson, he'd been told her name by Sophie, asked.

"Professor Snape loathes Gryffindors. He says they're the biggest bunch of dunderheads in his class out of all the houses, even worse than Hufflepuffs!" Draco said.

"Why Longbottom though?" Parkinson asked.

"Something about Longbottom's grandmother being on the Board of Governors. Like myself, people with relatives on the Board are entitled to benefits. I hope it's because Longbottom's dim. Wouldn't that be something? I say we fill in where the good professor cannot" Malfoy said as the rest of the group nodded.

It turned out that Longbottom could give as good as he got where Malfoy was concerned, sparking up a rivalry between the two that mostly revolved around the trading of insults of fluctuating degrees of viciousness. The rivalry forced a definitive line between the Slytherin and Gryffindor first years, who all thought Malfoy was unfairly berating their housemate. The Potions lesson following Malfoy's declarations hadn't helped either, Professor Snape was exceedingly biased towards the Gryffindors while favouring the Slytherins. Discussing the rivalry later with Sophie, she and Harry determined it did make a lot of sense for the two of them to disagree on basically everything. The Malfoys and Longbottoms were the leaders of two opposing factions on the Wizengamot and the two young boys were doing a fantastic job of imitating the positions their respective families took. They would be against each other regardless of which house they were in, the fact Slytherins and Gryffindors usually disliked each other only added another layer to their strife.

Divisions within Slytherin House itself rapidly developed among the first years as well, albeit not as decisively as between houses. Other years of Slytherins appeared to be compatible with each other, though Harry's year did not appear to be heading that direction despite their attempts at hazing. There had unknowingly already been separation immediately following the sorting, with a main group of purebloods that had all known each other before coming to Hogwarts centred around Malfoy containing the rest of the boys in Harry's dorm plus three of the girls, Pansy Parkinson, Millicent Bulstrode and Daphne Greengrass. Sophie was welcomed in this group but preferred to spend time with Harry, who was excluded because had only known Malfoy and Greengrass before Hogwarts in addition to being frowned upon by them because he was a half-blood. Tracey Davis, also having the same problems as Harry, often spent her time between the library fulfilling her desire to learn and with the second years whom Bartholomew Dylan had introduced her to.

When Harry did exceptionally well during classes his peers reacted with anger, because they didn't think a half-blood could be so adept with magic unlike what their parents had told them their whole lives, much the same way he expected. What he hadn't expected was Tracey wanting to be his new best friend and learn from him. Harry wasn't sure he wanted to devote time to teaching, he had his own studies to pursue with second year material, but the main problem though was Sophie did not get along with Tracey. Their differing personalities, Sophie going along reacting to things as they occurred and Tracey needing a plan for literally everything, clashed daily.

When Harry talked with Sophie about it, she'd hardly been sympathetic. "If you weren't friends with her I'd probably never talk to her. She has a plan for everything and I'm sure there are many we don't know about."

"So?"

"I can tell she hides behind friendliness but is really cunning and subtle. Who knows what she actually wants to do long term," Sophie cautioned.

"She just wants to be a good witch, what's wrong with that? I want to be the best wizard I can," Harry told her, playing devil's advocate.

"She gets awfully angry easily and holds grudges. You may not have noticed but she already hates Greengrass because she takes so long getting ready in the morning. What if you teach her something and she uses it to hurt someone?"

"Nobody is perfect. But yeah I do see what you mean, I hadn't decided what to do about it yet and I don't really want to put the time into it regardless. It would be smart to stay on her good side though, with what you've told me I don't want to make her mad." Harry mused as he decided he would answer any questions she had but not outright tutor.

"Sure, sure. There's something else though, it's not I don't like her for it but you'll want to know if you're going to be friendly with her. She's one quarter lilin," Sophie disclosed. "Parkinson got her to admit it asking about 'her elegant looks'," she finished with a drawl.

"Er, what's a lilin?" Harry questioned

"Oh, they're a humanlike species but more closely related to veela. Take a veela, make them half the size, drop the allure and bird transformation and that's what a full blooded lilin is. They're from Northern Europe and are known to make men do even more crazy and stupid things than they usually do through manipulation. That's why her chronic planning is so worrisome and why I want you to be wary of her," she explained. Harry, who had been introduced to veela by Sirius about a year ago, understood what Sophie was telling him and promised her he'd be extra careful.

The other problem classmate Harry had was Malfoy, who had decided Harry needed to be taken down a few pegs. Harry could expect to receive pot-shots concerning anything from his ever messy hair to not receiving any packages of sweets from home, which had been a particularly amusing conversation.

"Hey Potter, no care packages again? Pity there's no charity for half-bloods around," Malfoy taunted.

"Pft, some of us are simply better prepared," Harry dismissed him. He'd been told where the kitchens were so he had access to essentially any food item he desired and requested the house-elves to make.

"At least I have parents who can care about me," Malfoy goaded.

Harry, seeing it for what it was, outwardly kept himself calm even though he seethed inside. "One could argue I'm actually better cared for because my guardians don't want me to get fat," he responded.

"Are you a muggle, Potter? Us wizards can fix that," Malfoy teased.

Doing his best imitation of Andromeda as he quoted one of her favourite things to say, he primly replied, "it's the principle of the matter, Malfoy."

Harry spent much the first week at Hogwarts exploring the castle with Sophie during their free time, usually between the end of classes and curfew with a break during dinner. With the Marauder's Map exploring the castle was easy and exciting, it also allowed them to keep a watch out for unfriendly people, such as Filch or Mrs. Norris. Secret passages of numerous designs, some hidden as a plain section of wall further hidden behind tapestries and others simply hidden by a door, chambers looking long disused that required a password to enter, one hundred and forty two staircases of all shapes and sizes of varying quality could be found throughout the castle several of which shifted at seemingly random intervals, false steps that your leg would sink into if you didn't jump over it and the kitchens filled with a veritable legion of house-elves were among the many things the duo found during their adventures.

Sophie always brought along a simple self-made painting kit, and when they found a secluded area they would take a break every so often and she would decorate the castle with an assortment of small paintings. While she was doing this Harry would try to work on wandless magic, though without any success. Harry had been able to control his accidental magic since he was seven, but only direct it a certain way, not make it happen on demand. Remus had shown them a few examples during the summer, he could summon or banish objects, levitate things and cause his hand appear to be aflame with magic. Allegedly, wandless magic was quite different than with a wand as you couldn't use actual spells.

"You have to understand magic, how it works and what it does. Yes it does take much more power but that's barely scratching the surface," Remus had said. Harry thought he understood magical theory pretty well, all about intent, visualisation and proper channels of the flow of magical energy, so he took to carrying a stick around with him, attempting to get it to levitate. He thought he'd seen it vibrate a few times, but he wasn't sure.

One area they had yet to explore was the restricted third floor corridor they'd been told about at the welcoming feast. According to the Marauder's Map it was guarded by something named Fluffy, Harry couldn't decide if that was a bad or good thing, but it was all they had to go on. When Harry had written to Sirius the first night telling him about Dumbledore's warning his godfather had replied by the next morning's post saying he should look into it and have some extra adventure but to be careful. Sirius was certain Dumbledore wouldn't keep anything exceedingly dangerous in the castle, and if it was something somewhat dangerous there would be preventative warnings before the actual danger. Harry wished he had his father's infamous invisibility cloak but Sirius had told him, again, that James hadn't received it until his thirteenth birthday and neither would Harry, he would have to rely on and hone his own skills until then.

It was fortunate Harry decided to wait to investigate the third floor corridor until spending some time watching the Marauder's Map to see if any teachers patrolled it. On the second Monday of term after his third Potions lesson Professor Snape's voice carried over the sounds of students packing up to leave. "Potter, stay behind," it was said softly but its tone was grave. The professor had been watching him very closely all lesson and Harry couldn't think of anything he could be punished for, as Snape's voice nearly promised, his potion was nearly the best in class thanks to his mum's notes. Was avoiding the hazing by older Slytherins wrong? Or did this have to do with his father and Sirius?

Sophie told him she'd be waiting outside for him so they could go to Transfiguration together as he made to approach Professor Snape's desk. "Yes, Professor Snape?"

"The ignoramus who was your father and the imbecile you call your godfather were remorseless delinquents. Despite this, you have ended up in Slytherin House, and unfortunately for both of us, I am your Head of House. Therefore it is my duty to inform you that the Headmaster, for whatever reason, has chosen to take an interest in your schooling and behaviour. I suggest you seek to avoid any trouble, should I find the slightest indication of rule breaking the consequences will be quite harsh, believe me," Professor Snape divulged in a menacing tone.

"Thank you, sir, your advice is much appreciated," Harry replied in a dazed tone. The revelation was startling to him, but he figured being as far ahead in classes was reason enough to garner the attention of Dumbledore. Snape nodded and motioned towards the door as a dismissal, which Harry heeded absentmindedly.

The rest of the week Harry was in a constant state of anxiety due to Snape's information, between pushing himself even harder in classes and attentively watching the third floor on the Map, Harry was glad he could relax during flying lessons on Thursday. Harry himself was a fabulously gifted flyer, had been ever since his first birthday when Sirius had gotten him his first broom according to the man. Growing up he had always looked forward to when he would be brought to the Black Manor in the countryside, where he could zoom around to his heart's content. He was looking forward to trying out for the Slytherin Quidditch team next year. Unfortunately, these would add an extra classes with the Gryffindors every Thursday, in addition to Potions twice a week, and provide a theatre for the annoying Malfoy and Longbottom to continue. When Longbottom's broom had malfunctioned Harry was worried their flying time would be cancelled, but the boy had enough experience with a broom to make it to the ground unharmed, despite Malfoy's attempts to goad Longbottom by blaming his accident on user error.

While he was flying Harry felt his mind clear like it always did and he could think much more clearly. He realised the least likely time for someone to be around the third floor corridor was before breakfast on Saturday morning, so that was when he would investigate. Heading back to the castle afterwards he discussed it with Sophie and she agreed his idea would most likely be the best.

That's how the two of them found themselves slipping out of the Slytherin common room at six in the morning on Saturday. With the map out they dodged both Filch and Mrs. Norris, took a detour around Dumbledore who was descending the grand staircase onto the first floor and made quick time with several shortcuts. The whole corridor looked dusty and unused with none of the torches found throughout the castle lit, not altogether unexpected.

"Do you think they have any wards?" Sophie whispered.

"Nothing bad, this is a school after all. An invisible barrier if anything, but those aren't hard to break. I think I could do it?" Harry acknowledged.

They crept along the corridor without hindrance until they came to the door where the Map displayed a dot labelled 'Fluffy' on the other side. Harry withdrew his elm wand as Sophie did the same, just in case, as he reached for the handle. Both of them holding their breath, Harry moved to open the door as quietly as possible. It was locked.

"You cast the unlocking charm," Harry told Sophie.

" _Alohomora_." With a loud click that sounded like an explosion in the silent corridor the lock disengaged.

Harry eased the door open. "Shite," he breathed out. The room contained a humongous three-headed dog, asleep. It nearly filled the corridor even lying down, its snores were thunderous, ropes of saliva hung from yellow fangs as it drooled and its noses twitched every which way.

"This is Fluffy?" Sophie murmured. Then her eyes widened, and she pointed to the floor in between two of the heads, "look."

Harry saw the trapdoor she had brought to his attention, and he knew for sure now that whatever had been at Gringotts was now hidden at Hogwarts. He needed to tell Sirius. "Let's leave before it wakes up, we found what we wanted," he said. They closed the door and Harry reapplied the lock with a charm.

Since breakfast wouldn't start for another thirty minutes, they went back to the Slytherin common room where Harry could write to Sirius asking if he wanted to do some literal marauding. Once he returned from his room to gather writing material Sophie and he found a secluded table. While writing his letter he noticed Sophie was acting decidedly distressed, as she did every time they were in the common room.

"What's wrong with the common room?" he queried.

"Nothing."

"Uh huh, I believe that as much as the sky is green. Try again," Harry coaxed.

"Wait, the sky isn't green?!" Sophie gasped.

"Ha ha, you can tell me you know. We just went on an adventure together, does that mean nothing to you?" he asked in a faux hurt tone.

With a sigh she replied, "if you must know, I'm afraid of water." She motioned towards the long window that looked out into the quickly brightening lake as the sun rose. "I nearly drowned when I was five. I still have no idea how I survived, I can't remember. It must've been accidental magic because one moment I was panicking like mad and then I woke up on the shore."

Harry had no idea what to say to that. "Oh. I'm sorry for asking," he told her but she only shrugged.

By the end of the third week, Harry had settled into a routine at Hogwarts. He'd perform outstandingly during classes, breeze through his homework and then spend time studying ahead in the library or practising magic in one of the empty password protected chambers he'd found while exploring the castle. Sophie joined him sometimes, but she lacked Harry's aggressive drive to be the best, and spent much time painting in her dorm. In fact, she'd removed the tapestry and used the wall itself as a surface as well as paint her bedroom door which led to all her roommates asking them to paint theirs. She had agreed, for a price of course. Sirius had replied to Harry's information on the third floor with a Howler that Harry had deftly neutralised, reminding himself to thank Dora for teaching him the spell to do so, as the letter had contained the overused name joke Sirius used. " _Are you serious? No, I'm Sirius. Good to know you're enjoying Hogwarts kiddo._ " Which Harry had no desire to be broadcasted to the Great Hall at Sunday morning breakfast. They were now in the process of deciding when Sirius would sneak into Hogwarts and they would go down the trapdoor.

Harry had resigned himself to the fact he would teach himself everything he learned during his time at Hogwarts. Well, except Herbology, but who cared about gardening anyway? So when Professor Quirrell asked him if he would join him for tea after lunch on Friday after a class, he was hopeful something would develop. The defence professor, while he did maintain a heavy stutter, was competent and did an acceptable job teaching. Harry had heard some Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs say he was hopelessly incapable, and he wondered if the professor taught the two classes differently because he was prejudiced, much like Professor Snape.

Knocking on Professor Quirrell's third floor office door, he was welcomed in. "H-h-hello Mr. P-Potter, I appreciate you joining m-m-me. You've d-done quite well in m-m-my class."

"Yes sir, defence is rather easy for me. I enjoy learning it as it's incredibly interesting. The other classes are all well and good, but really they're not as useful as Defence Against the Dark Arts," Harry informed him while Quirrell prepared tea.

When they both were seated Quirrell seemed to fortify himself, took a deep breath and then shuddered. When he spoke his voice had changed tone and quality, losing the stutter and gaining a self-assured aspect. "I quite agree Mr. Potter. You remind me of myself when I was here at Hogwarts. Not a point missed on quizzes, essays are well written and flawless practical work, never seeming to struggle with a single assignment, and not only in my class but all the other teachers are in agreement you are the most promising student in the year."

"I want to be, professor. To be the best wizard I can. Anything less would be unacceptable," Harry told him, passing off his change in voice as trivial.

"Yes, we are quite alike Mr. Potter, I to follow that line of thinking. Therefore I have a proposition for your consideration. How would you like to be tutored by myself? To explore magic on a practical and powerful level few magicals ever seek?" Professor Quirrell asked him.

Harry gaped momentarily, this was exactly what his highest hopes had been. "I would be incredibly grateful, sir. Truly."

"These lessons will not be easy Mr. Potter, you'll have to work very hard. I will not be there to teach you spells or incantations, though I will give you hints as to the type of magic which would be helpful, if I must. I will put you into situations where you will be required to adapt and decide the best magic to help yourself. I assure you, you will be motivated to learn not only jinxes, hexes and curses but also transfiguration, charms and counters, all portions of a proper defence education. Not the drivel the majority of people expect from my class, what do think of that?"

"I think I'm ready to begin at your convenience, sir," Harry said.

"Very well. You must understand as well utmost secrecy is required concerning these lessons. Personal tutoring is, unfortunately, rather frowned upon at Hogwarts," Professor Quirrell remarked.

"Understood, professor."

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	8. Run it

A/N : Just want to take a moment to explicitly iterate this is not a Harry/Tonks story. Ok, done. In other pairing news, there will be none before a person is in their third year, and even then it'll be the whimsical kinda lame not really actually a relationship you'd expect from thirteen year olds. Furthermore, like your average teenager people will be in relationships with multiple people, there is no one defining pairing.

A/N 2: That feel when you think you're a dedicated potterhead but then you forget about Astronomy class and Dean Thomas, doubt anyone noticed that but sorry folks.

A/N 3: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros or Disney. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 8: Run It

As October passed the weather at Hogwarts gradually worsened. A damp chill permeated through the castle while the grounds were pummelled with rain for days on end, causing the Great Lake to significantly rise and flower beds to turn into muddy streams. On October 31st, Harry's mood paralleled the stormy conditions perfectly. Ten years had passed since the death of his parents but everyone was celebrating the anniversary of Voldemort's fall, which had occurred on the same day.

Of course there were students who like Harry would not celebrate, although it was because they bemoaned the Dark Lord's defeat. In public these grievances were well hidden, but in the Slytherin Common Room a growing minority openly voiced their displeasure, sometimes going so far as to declare things would be better if the Dark Lord had won. The majority of students appeared to frown upon these dissidents but did nothing to stop them, it was a new development and assumed as long as no one was threatened it wasn't worth clashing over. Though he didn't spend a whole lot of time in the common room, Harry knew the catalyst giving the group courage to speak up was Draco Malfoy. Between the boy's loudmouthed support of pureblood supremacist ideals and his father's position leading a major alliance in the Wizengamot people were emboldened, the group expanded upon and incorporated the group of first year friends Malfoy surrounded himself with since the beginning of the year. Though the older years were distant in their association, two months into term a definite faction of likeminded individuals had developed in Slytherin House consisting of all seven years and about a quarter of the house.

Harry disgustedly observed this sitting in the common room, for once, after class with Sophie, who maintained her fear of the lake, preparing to burn letters they had written to the dead which they would ignite at sunset in offering as per the Samhain ritual tradition. Every year after he burned them Harry would feel a rush of pure love, and he just knew his parents were getting his letters on the other side. It was one of his most treasured feelings. He made no effort to hide his scowl as he watched them, remembering each of their faces and names so he could get back at the people supporting the group which had murdered his parents.

"I wish there was something I could do," Harry lamented to Sophie. "I can't reign in Malfoy because even if Sirius puts pressure on Narcissa it won't do anything, he's already tried that. I'm pretty sure if I tried to duel any of them, they'd have me fight some older student because everyone already knows I'm better than the second years, Merlin I could probably even beat those two fourth years-"

"Bit full of yourself, aren't you?" Sophie interrupted.

Harry continued without acknowledging her, "-I mean I've already made iffy allies in Nott, Blaise, Daphne and the second years but everyone else seems to live and let live. And no, I'm not full of myself, they look like they each have as many brain cells as Crabbe and Goyle have between them, I sincerely think I could beat those fourth years, not any of the others. I've been holding back when we practice duel, to be honest." He was already better than her in fighting skill when they'd been tutored over summer but after brutal sessions with Quirrell every Friday for the last six weeks, he was leaps and bounds ahead. Tomorrow's lesson would be a satisfying one as they worked wonders at releasing restless energy or in this case, anger.

Sophie glowered at him briefly because she had thought he wasn't kerbing his skill, "well you better not anymore. This weekend, no hexes barred." Then a mischievous glint appeared in her blue eyes, "let's prank the pants off them. Like, literally. You remember the slow acting vanishing hex Sirius used on us? By Magic, I can't wait to watch their faces as their underpants slowly disappear. We'll only be a little late to the feast even if we curse all their chairs," she quietly giggled.

"Absolutely brilliant, I'm in," Harry told her.

While tensions between the other years may have increased throughout the school year the first year Slytherins had reached a mutual understanding, balancing out into their social niches. The general consensus was that Harry was the most skilled and powerful, he easily outshone everyone else. Blaise Zabini and Daphne Greengrass, recognising this, had broken out of their previous all pureblood circle and seemed to be burgeoning socialites, keeping an ear to the ground being general gossips, and Harry was glad to be on friendly terms with them. Nott followed Harry's initial impression retreating to his books, but he almost always read in the common room keeping an observant eye on things, those perceptive enough themselves noticed. So when Sophie and Harry arrived as some of the last Slytherins to show up to the Halloween Feast, because Dumbledore insisted on using the names of muggle holidays, and joined Daphne and Blaise it wasn't anything out of the ordinary. What was abnormal was Professor Quirrell bursting through the main doors to the Great Hall, heavily breathing and unhealthily pale screaming at the top of his lungs.

"TROLLS! TROLLS IN THE DUNGEONS! Thought you ought to know…" the professor trailed off as he nearly collapsed but managed to support himself on the Ravenclaw table to his left, taking deep gasps of breath.

Immediate panic erupted. Only after a salvo of purple fireworks exploded from Professor Dumbledore's wand did silence return.

"Prefects," the Headmaster stated calmly, "lead your houses back to the dormitories immediately! Professors, with me."

The other three houses rapidly vacated the hall. Harry spotted one his competitors for the top academic spot, Hermione Granger, nearly interrogating her friends about trolls. Weasley looked to be halfway engaged while Longbottom seemed glad to have a distraction from his previously glum state, like Harry he too had lost his parents on this day ten years ago.

The Slytherins, on the other hand, were appalled at the Headmaster's ignorance. "Father always knew he was mad!" Malfoy crowed, "sending a whole house towards the danger. Honestly!" Harry and the rest of the house couldn't help but agree and stayed put at their dining table.

Harry's mind whirled while they waited for some sign the danger had passed and the trolls had been defeated or removed. There was a very good chance this was related to the third floor corridor, things like this never happened at Hogwarts as far as he'd heard. Did Quirrell have anything to do with it? As much as Harry enjoyed working with magic with the professor, sometimes he did seem a little off, but this incident with the troll was the only reason of his suspicions. In addition, Harry was even more excited to be able to explore what was beneath Fluffy's trapdoor with Sirius, he only had to wait just over another week because they were doing it during the first Quidditch match. Sirius had wanted to go during the first Hogsmeade weekend, the last weekend in October, but Harry had figured, and Sirius agreed, that more people would attend the match which would give them less of a chance of being detected. If whatever was being guarded warranted letting multiple trolls loose, it had to be important.

Nearly an hour after Quirrell's warning, Professor Snape appeared in the Great Hall sporting a distinct limp. "The five trolls have been routed. You appear to have continued your meal, there will be none provided in the common room. The beasts were in the Charms corridor, you are safe in the dungeons. Proceed," he directed Slytherin House before sweeping out the hall, maintaining some grace despite his apparent injury.

"Five trolls?! Bloody hell," Sophie exclaimed next to him.

"Well, that explains why Professor Quirrell ran. He's supposed to be a troll specialist," Tracey Davis, who had joined them during the wait, informed them.

"Really? How interesting," Blaise commented, while Daphne nodded in agreement next to him.

When they got back to the common room Sophie and Harry stuck around instead of heading up to their dorms like they usually would, they wanted to witness the fruit of their work. It was supposed to be a slow working hex over the course of an hour, but as soon as the chairs Sophie cursed were sat in their occupants' slacks and skirts changed a variety of flamboyant neon colours including blue, green, orange, yellow and best of all were Malfoy's bright pink trousers. Harry raised an eyebrow at Sophie, who was chortling to herself.

"The Remus special," she told him, which meant she had used a special jinx Remus had devised that, for reasons that escaped everyone else, couldn't be dispelled and faded with time.

It seemed the older Slytherins had figured this out as well, and as word spread of the nature of the curse those pranked moved en masse to the dormitories to change. Even though they scowled at the rest of the house they were good-naturedly laughed at. Harry figured it out then and shot a wide smile at Sophie.

"Merlin, that's amazing. So they change but still have the pants hex. A one-two punch. Well if this doesn't do anything I don't know what will," Harry said.

The faces and reactions of the usually uptight and proud purebloods as their underpants vanished were truly something to behold. The icing on the cake was them trying to figure out how half of them had gotten pranked twice and the others only once and wondering if their clothes would change colour later. Harry had a hard time not laughing, as the victims were less than forthcoming with their predicament.

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"Y-you are angry," Quirrell stated during a pause in the lesson after Harry lost their fourth duel, but his tone was that of a question.

"Yes. People were being stupid yesterday," Harry told him.

"Ab-b-bout what?" Harry could never figure out what made the professor's stutter come and go, sometimes it was there, other times it was gone.

"Just some Slytherins supporting the Death Eaters," Harry said, and Quirrell looked mildly interested in that.

"Do you think of them as evil, Mr. Potter?"

"Of course I do! They killed my parents," Harry exclaimed.

"The reason we have these lessons is so you can become a more powerful wizard, is it not Mr. Potter?" Quirrell asked, and Harry nodded his affirmation. "You must understand these students want power as well, ambition is a Slytherin trait after all. Fear of the Death Eaters, fear of the Dark Lord, that gives them power, albeit a different type than we are working with here. The rise of the Dark Lord was in reaction to an increase of muggleborns attempting to wield power within the wizarding world, disobeying laws and causing economic havoc. Much like you observed yesterday, the purebloods were disturbed and sought to re-establish order. Does that seem evil?"

"Well no, but that wasn't what they were doing yesterday," Harry responded. If this was about power though, Harry thought, he'd just have to be able to put them all in their place by showing them what true power was all about, no politics or pranks from the shadows. Like Professor Quirrell had said, his desire to wield sheer overwhelming force was the reason for these lessons.

"Ah, but they are all only children, beliefs are easy to impress upon them," Quirrell reasoned, Harry figured he could agree with that but that didn't mean he would go easy on them. "V-v-very well, shall w-we continue?" The professor asked as he shot a silent orange spell at Harry, from personal painful experience he knew it to be a powerful Stinging Jinx, he made to dodge it and the fight was on.

True to his words spoken before they had begun these duels/lessons, Quirrell required Harry to immerse himself in studying expeditiously using any resource available to him, including the Hogwarts library, Dora's old school books he had nicked and his mother's journals, unless he wanted to be hit with some curse or another. The learning curve was incredibly steep, he learned as many defensive spells as offensive spells, curses, jinxes and hexes and their counters, transfiguration and charms above an average first year's level, in conjunction with seemingly inane things which at first glance had a specific purpose, but could be easily used for any other number of things. Professor Quirrell had started him on doing that after their third lesson, when Harry had been floundering under his teacher's assault.

"Mr. Potter, you're limiting yourself oh so very much. It's painful to watch," Professor Quirrell said.

"How so? I'm trying as hard as I can!"

"That I can tell, no what I intend to convey is the fact you are following figurative rules. Rules made for lesser men, with lesser magical potential, plebeians who require magic to be simple enough to comprehend in their troll-sized brains. Unfortunately, these are taught to most magical children before they even begin their tenure at Hogwarts, limiting them for their entire lives. The first, and only, rule of magic you will be required to follow is that there are no rules. Follow that, and your abilities will be unchecked," Quirrell lectured. "Take _incendio_ for example, what does it do?"

"It's a thin stream of fire, for lighting candles or stuff on fire," Harry said.

"Yes, yes. But that is incorrect. Observe," Quirrell told him as he backed away from Harry. Then the professor cast and fire exploded outwards from him in a vortex, creating a wall of flame in a circle going nearly all the way to the ceiling. Harry could only gape in amazement.

After the fire died, Quirrell addressed Harry, "now, granted, it is dangerous with flame as if you hold too powerful a vortex for too long it can suffocate you. Unless you cast a Bubblehead Charm, of course. The point, Mr. Potter, is that magic is flexible and will do anything if your intent and power are enough to fuel it. You make things happen with magic, not tell it how things should be and to make it so."

From that advice Harry found himself exploring endless possibilities, from a new complexity in his locking charm, to finally being able to tentatively levitate small things wandlessly, to an exponential increase in his counter-curse casting ability, where previously he had only known they could be directed at a specific point now he cast them as a field which would neutralize a curse before it hit anything. According to Professor Quirrell, that was a fifth year level skill and Harry felt quite proud of himself for it. After he had progressed to what Quirrell deemed acceptable, not that Harry was proficient but he understood the concepts enough to build his skills further, Harry had been forced to begin learning situational awareness and how magic could be used to his benefit during a fight. The idea being Harry didn't just want to be a good duelist, but a proficient fighter in case anyone more capable than himself got on his bad side and decided to do something about it. Sirius had shown Harry, in the Black family pensieve, one of the times his parents had faced off against Voldemort himself, the magic they wielded and their capabilities were phenomenal, and Harry had every intention of being even better.

Today's lesson Harry had to push himself as much as possible, the professor would disillusion and silence himself while attempting to curse him. Harry used the same method Sirius had tested him on in Ollivander's shop, where he would extend his magical perception while trying to detect Quirrell's location or spells. Unlike Ollivander who had simply been standing in the shadows, Quirrell was actively hiding and wrapping his magic around himself, and Harry was required to focus particularly hard to detect even the slightest hint of magic until right before a spell was being cast at him. Harry knew Professor Quirrell was going easy on him, allowing a smidgen of magic loose so Harry at least had a chance of knowing where he was and flaring his magic right before casting, which alerted Harry's senses like a rampaging hippogriff, he also only used the simplest of spells, nothing particularly destructive, and finally, Professor Quirrell knew how to ward the room so Harry didn't detect the massive amount of interference that came from the Hogwarts wards. Harry held no delusions that if the professor really wanted to hurt him, he easily could.

" _Protego_ ," Harry blocked a pair of Body-Bind Curses with a general Shield Charm while bringing his wand into an offensive position, casting towards where he was pretty sure Professor Quirrell was, " _flipendo_! _Pulsus_! _Ventus_!" A Knockback Jinx, followed by a Banishing Charm and completing the spell-chain with an overpowered Wind Charm, it wasn't a particularly harmful set of spells but it would do a brilliant job of clearing an area out.

Everything was quiet for a moment and Harry noticed his head was throbbing from maintaining his intense focus for so long, and because of the ache he couldn't sense the slightest hint of where Quirrell was. _Ping_! Suddenly a spell was coming at him from the left, Harry tried to do something, anything, but he wouldn't get a shield up fast enough and even as he moved to dodge the soft red light of a Stunning Charm filled his vision before knocking him unconscious.

It was always slightly disorienting, waking up from an _ennervate_ spell, so Professor Quirrell gave Harry a moment to sit up before speaking. "Quite a competent spell-chain, if it had worked. Regardless, what went wrong? Why were you not prepared for my spell?" he asked Harry.

Harry thought about that, replying too quickly with a stupid answer would only earn him a Stinging Jinx. "Well, I was too focused on casting. I fell into a routine after going at it for…?" Harry trailed off in inquiry, looking up at the professor from his seat on the floor.

"F-f-fourteen minutes," Quirrell supplied with a nod.

"Yeah, so, that's a long duel and it was the fifth one. I fell into a routine and didn't keep my guard up despite knowing I was in a hostile situation. It was stupid," Harry admitted.

"R-respectable, Mr. Potter, w-w-we are in agreement, and out of time, it appears. A warning, n-next week I will begin conjuring obstacles. Decide however to prepare for that development yourself," Professor Quirrell informed Harry.

"Thank you, sir. I look forward to it," Harry said as he prepared to leave, making a mental note to make sure he brushed up on his transfiguration, he was working his way through the third year material and with Professor Quirrell warning him he would definitely need to be in top form.

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Harry groaned as he awoke on the morning of Saturday the ninth of November, his back was extremely sore from being banished into a boulder by Professor Quirrell the previous day and made it difficult to sleep, but today was an important day. Sirius and Dora would be sneaking into the castle after breakfast and take Harry along while they tackled the third floor corridor. Before then he had to make sure there was some cover story as to why he wouldn't be attending Slytherin's first quidditch match of the year, as much as he wanted to be there. Sophie would probably help him out there, but he had to wait in the common room to make sure he caught her before breakfast. With a sigh he disabled the wards that sealed his room and trudged to the bathroom to prepare for the day, hoping none of his roommates would see the huge bruise his back assuredly bore.

"Morning, Sophie. Breakfast?" Harry greeted as she approached him in the common room some time later.

"Good morning, sure I'm ready to go," she replied, appearing to already be dressed to head out to the quidditch pitch.

Shortly after leaving the common room Harry decided to address what was on his mind, "listen, Sophie, do you think you could do me a favour?"

"Uh, depends, that sounds rather open ended."

Harry motioned them into an empty room, briefly noticing it was a small unused potions room, before casting several protective wards he knew while Sophie looked on. "Alright. Today Sirius, Dora and I are going to see what's the deal with the third floor corridor."

"Oh great, I can't wait! This will be awesome! When are we going?" she excitedly said.

Damn, Harry thought, this was going to be harder than he imagined. "Well," he started, carrying out the word, but before he could continue Sophie broke in.

"That's a rather deep subject, Harry. Are you sure you want to go there?" she quipped, looking extremely proud of herself. Despite being on the receiving end Harry couldn't help but chuckle.

He sobered once he remembered Sophie wasn't coming with them and he'd have to break it to her. "Sirius doesn't want you to go, Sarah would probably hang, draw and quarter him if she found out he let you do anything dangerous," he told her. "I'm sorry, but that was the rule," he apologised as her face adopted a crushed look.

Sophie took a moment to think it through, but while she knew Harry was right she was still upset. "So what did you want?" she asked coldly.

Knowing she wouldn't receive this well he just ploughed on, "I was hoping you'd cover for me in case anyone asks questions. I doubt it, but just in case."

"What do I get for doing it?"

"I dunno. Anything? What do you want?"

Sophie obviously had something in mind because she quickly replied, "I get to paint your room, and you have no choice what I paint either. I could paint unicorns and you won't say a word."

Harry wanted to protest but knew he really did owe her big time so he didn't. "Deal, and thanks. You're the best," he told her.

As soon as the words left his mouth Sophie was already moving to leave. "I'm still mad though," she shot over her shoulder. Harry could live with that, even if she was frosty with him the rest of the morning, they would have one of their biweekly duelling session later where she could take out her anger on him.

After breakfast, while the rest of the school was heading down to the quidditch pitch, Harry excused himself and ducked into an alcove to activate the Marauder's Map in order to find Dora and Sirius. He spotted them in the NEWT DADA classroom on the third floor, the closest room to a secret passage connecting Honeydukes to Hogwarts. Making his way there Harry was buzzing with nervous excitement, he didn't know what they would run into going down the trapdoor but between the three of them going they shouldn't have too much trouble, it would be fun. Entering the room he didn't see anyone and figured the two of them were invisible, but as soon as he closed the door he heard Dora squeal "Harry!" and he was caught in a strangling hug, barely suppressing the desire to wince when her arms made contact with his back.

"Nice to see you too, Dora," he said. Looking around Harry saw Sirius leaning casually against the teacher's desk with his wand out, "hey Sirius!"

Sirius came over and once Harry was released from Dora's grasp he looked him over making sure he was well. "Excited? Just remember, not a word to Andy or Ted or they'll go mental." Harry nodded because yes, Andromeda would have a fit if she knew what they were doing. "Anyway, I'm really curious what Albus has going on in the castle, but it won't be anything too bad, so we should be able to be in and out before the game's over."

"Good because I have so much to tell you. Like about the prank we pulled on all the purebloods!" Harry announced. While he had mentioned the trolls and pureblood supremacists in his letters the prank was something to be described in person.

Sirius gave him a wide grin, "wonderful. Let's hear all about it while we look over the map to make sure we won't have any problems." Harry launched into the tale of their Samhain prank and Sophie's idea of a double prank, by the end all three of them were having a laughing fit.

Once he collected himself Sirius asked, "Snape definitely knew it was you, right? I'm sure even if you didn't he'd assume it was."

Remembering the looks he'd received from his Potions professor the next day, Harry knew exactly what Sirius was talking about. "Yeah, he actually had me stay after class and told me I had come very close to crossing the line and if I ever did there would be hell to pay," he told them with a shrug.

"Typical," Sirius muttered.

"Oh and Sirius, Sophie may be somewhat cross with you, but I swear I was acting in your best interests," Harry said.

"What'd you do?" Sirius questioned.

At the same time, Dora proclaimed with a heavily teasing lilt in her voice, "oh someone's in trouble."

"I may have used her to cover for me while we're doing this while she wanted to come," Harry confided.

"What? Why? I like her!" Dora declared while Sirius looked on with a troubled expression.

"I figured if Sarah heard that you let her do something like this, she wouldn't be very happy. See? Like I said, acting in your best interest."

Letting out a large breath Sirius nodded, "okay you're right. But I'm sure Sophie didn't like being manipulated Harry, it's not a very nice thing to do."

"Oh of course not. I paid a high enough price for it though, so it's fine," Harry mentioned.

"And what was that?" Dora asked.

"She gets to paint my room. You know how she is, painting pretty much anything she gets her hands on. The worst part though is I have no say in what it is, she threatened me with unicorns," he told them, causing a bout of chuckles.

"Alright," Sirius said authoritatively while grabbing a rucksack and throwing it onto his shoulder, "it looks like nearly everyone's down at the pitch and there's no one guarding the closed corridor according to the map, though there may be a ghost."

"Ghost?" Dora asked.

"Yeah, the map only shows bodies, not ghosts. Luckily we got it to show Peeves because he's a poltergeist, but otherwise we'll have to keep our eyes out," Sirius warned. He continued, "Dora you know the standard anti-detection spells but for the love of Merlin please try your hardest to not trip. If it was convenient I'd cast a Body-Bind on you and carry you. Harry, I'll cast them on you, but try to remember these as they're good to know."

"Thanks, Sirius, I will for sure."

"Silencing Charm, _silencio_ ," Sirius incanted while casting at Harry, "Disillusionment Charm, _pigmentum immisceo_ , the Smell-Blocking Charm, _oppilo ordoratus_ and finally the Notice-Me-Not, while it's not good to hide things it doesn't hurt and if you have a slight slip up it'll probably do its job, _notitiam prohibeo_." Harry was glad to already know of three of them, the silencing charm was basic, the notice-me-not was well known but not widely used since it wasn't very effective, while he knew of it he couldn't hope to cast the disillusionment charm, not yet, but he could see the benefits of the anti-smell spell. "Those will do you a whole lot of good. Now, I've got your father's invisibility cloak and we'll go under that as well, even if it's not far, now gather around close. Here Harry, hold the map while we're walking." Harry took the map and the three of them stood very close to each other while Sirius covered them in the cloak. Once they were under Harry saw Sirius and Dora cast the four spells on themselves and Harry could barely tell they were there, if he hadn't known already it'd be near impossible.

Two taps on his shoulder were the notification he got that they were starting to move. Checking the Marauder's Map and not seeing anyone between the classroom they were in and their destination they continued. The three of them slowly continued, easily entering the closed corridor and stopped right outside what was Fluffy's room. The cerberus was quite obviously awake now as it's dot on the map was moving back and forth, as if it was pacing. Harry felt the cloak whip off them and Sirius and Dora quickly became visible again.

"We'll get to you in a moment, Harry," Sirius told him. "Bleh, finding some way to deal with the cerberus was about as easy as finding a snitch in the dark, but having the Black family library at your disposal does have its advantages," he said as he reached into his rucksack and withdrew a shrunken harp. Two waves of his wand later a soothing melody was playing and Harry watched on the map as Fluffy's dot stopped moving. Sirius opened the door and strode right in without a care in the world shocking both Harry and Dora, but the three-headed dog was snoozing away, apparently music was some type of special trick. He set the harp down in a corner and turned back to them, "okay I've set the harp will play for two hours. It'll stay asleep."

Getting confirmation on that, Harry withdrew his elm wand and cast " _finite incantatem_ " on himself multiple times, countering the spells Sirius put on him, the disillusionment charm proving slightly difficult since he didn't know how it specifically worked. This earned him an appraising look from Dora, while Sirius was busy warding the door they had just come through.

"Nice," Dora commented, "I doubt I could have done that in first year."

"Done what?" Sirius asked as he finished with the door.

"Countered your spells," Harry chirped.

Sirius looked at him somewhat startled like he hadn't expected him to do that, "Righto, well done Harry." Then he aimed his wand at the trapdoor cautiously, "wands out and ready for anything to come out of there. I'm about to open it."

Harry drew both his wands, he wanted to be fully prepared after all, but when the trapdoor opened nothing happened. Sirius approached it slowly, "looks to be a big drop, hang on." He flicked his wand and a ball of light shot out going down. "There's some plant that reacts badly to the light, we should be ok." He reached into his rucksack and withdrew three shrunken brooms, resizing them before passing one to Dora and another to Harry.

"It'll feel so good to be on the trusty Cleansweep again, those school brooms were horrible, I can't wait 'til winter break to fly all the time" Harry commented.

"Just don't get too lively, the last thing we need right now is for you to crash," was Sirius' reply before he dropped into the trapdoor.

The light protected them from whatever plant they would have encountered, and the three of them flew straight on to the door in the opposite wall, Sirius and Dora constantly flicking their wands to check for wards. Upon entering the next room they were met with the sight of hundreds of keys enchanted with wings to fly, it only took them a short amount of time to figure out which one was the correct key and between the three of them devised a strategy to trap it. The following room, upon entering, revealed itself to be a humongous chess set.

"Think we can fly over?" Harry asked.

"Don't see why not," Sirius replied.

It turned out they could just fly over, so they went on to the next room. Immediately after Sirius opened the door, he froze and slowly closed the door again. Harry and Dora were hit with some foul smell, and Sirius turned to them with a stern expression on his face, "there's a massive mountain troll in there. Dora and I will take care of it, we'll let you know when it's safe, Harry."

Harry knew he was lucky to be along for the ride, so he only nodded instead of arguing.

"Wait, wait, maybe we should shrink our brooms first?" Harry asked, it seemed like a good idea so they did so with Sirius placing them back in his rucksack.

Sirius and Dora dashed into the room, and a minute later Dora poked her head out motioning for him to come along. If the smell wasn't so bad it made him want to vomit, Harry would've stopped and stared at the fifteen foot tall troll that was bound in arm width ropes but instead he followed the other two into the next room. Black fire sprang up before the door in front of them and turning around purple fire had blocked their retreat.

"Bloody fucking buggering hell," Dora swore.

Sirius was checking just what had happened, "dammit, neither of us checked for wards. At least it's only an activation ward so nobody knows we're here. But there is an alert ward on the next door, that'll take me some time to disable. Meanwhile, why don't you two figure out what we need to do to get through the fire?"

It turned out there was a riddle describing what a set of phials held, some which were poison, some were wine, one would get you back and one would allow you forward. It took the two of them over twenty minutes to figure out the riddle, but they were further dismayed by there only being enough potion for one person to go forward or back through the fire and flames.

"Hang on, I want to try something," Harry said. He took one they both agreed was wine and poured it out. Nothing happened. "Damn." But when he put it back into its slot it refilled. He shared a grin with Dora, "brilliant."

Several minutes later Sirius spoke up, but breathing rather heavily, "wow, Dumbledore must've done that himself. It's disabled temporarily, maybe ten, fifteen minutes so hopefully we're near the end." He paused to breathe, "what'd you guys figure out?"

Once it was explained to him Sirius grabbed the phial that would get them through the black flames, "I'll go first, then Dora, then Harry. Harry before you come through, refill the phial and then bring it with you. It's how we're getting back after all." Harry agreed that was a smart idea.

They moved quickly, the alert ward would rework itself soon, and Harry soon entered the last room while carrying the phial of potion. He was shivering since the potion made his whole body feel like ice, which made him focus on not spilling any potion, but once he was comfortable enough to look up he saw Dora and Sirius standing in front of a pedestal with an odd looking blood red stone on it.

"Have any idea what this could be, Harry?" Dora asked. Harry just shook his head. "Yeah neither do we."

"All that trouble for a stone? Is there a hidden door or something?" Harry asked.

"Nope, we checked. Only magic we found is the alert ward and the stone itself. Whatever it is, it's been exposed to a lot of magic," Dora said.

"Tight schedule that we are on, I say we take it and investigate later. Any disagreement? Nope? Levitate the rock, would you Dora?" Sirius rattled off. Dora levitated the rock while Sirius conjured a cloth and wrapped it around it, proceeding to levitate it into his rucksack.

"Good thing Dumbledore probably hasn't seen Indiana Jones," Harry quipped in a blasé tone.

"Shite," Dora murmured.

"Shite is right," Sirius agreed. "Time to go. Potion, Harry?"

Sirius went through, and soon after his arm reappeared with the potion for Dora, and again for Harry. They made quick time returning through the obstacles, pausing to reorient themselves in Fluffy's room. Once the trapdoor was closed Sirius checked his watch to see how long they had taken.

"Fifty seven minutes, not bad team, not bad. Check the map Harry, a typical quidditch game runs about two hours so we should still be in the clear," Sirius said.

Harry pulled the map out of his robes and looked it over. There was a group of people moving from the pitch but half of them were first years, one was the Weasley prefect, one was Professor Sinistra who taught astronomy and the final was Madame Pomfrey the school Healer, so maybe there had been an accident? It wasn't unprecedented for the crowd to be hurt during a match. Other than that it seemed the game was still going. "Yeah, it's all good. There's a group going to the infirmary but that's on the second floor so you two can slip out easy," Harry told them.

"We'll go back to that Defense classroom, just in case there's a ghost outside or something," Sirius said, taking the wards off the door. "We'll need to move quickly once I stop the harp since the pupper here will wake up quickly. Harry, take Dora's hand, I'm going to put the spells on you again. I'll get under the cloak, then Dora cast the spells on yourself. I'll summon, shrink and put the harp away before casting them on myself and we'll be on our way."

After they had made their way to the classroom and said their goodbyes Sirius turned to Harry, sporting a crooked grin, "tell Sophie I say hi and that I'm sorry, will you? I'm sure she would've enjoyed our trip, I'll take her on an adventure some other time."

"Sure," Harry replied, already knowing he was going to tell her every last detail to satiate her curiosity.

Right before they left Dora left him with her parting comment, "also, tell your girlfriend I look forward to spending girl-time with her over winter break," right before the two of them disappeared.

He could only gape making faint sounds of protest, it almost sounded like he was choking. "What? But she's not- I've never- what?" he finally managed to stutter out. Harry imagined if they weren't silenced Sirius and Dora would be cackling like hyenas.

There was no reason to hang around so Harry checked the map once again and noticed the game must be over as nearly the entire school was moving in a crowd towards the castle. He wanted to make sure no one noticed he was gone so he would slip into the mass of people and find Sophie.

He found her as soon as she came into the Entrance Hall, and they absconded into the chamber they had been in before the sorting. "How was the game?" Harry asked.

"Slytherin won, though expect the Gryffindors to be mad for a while. Someone cursed the bludgers and they attacked Longbottom in the stands," Sophie explained. "Weasley took the hits for him, can you imagine a more Gryffindor thing to do?" Harry made a noise of agreement and understanding, that was why he'd seen the group going up to the hospital wing. "Anyway, in the end Higgs was the better seeker and caught the snitch. Oh and Daphne and Blaise asked about you but I told them you had figured something out with some charm and needed to research it."

"Great, everyone already thinks I should've been a Ravenclaw anyway," Harry said sarcastically. "Thanks again, though. It was pretty underwhelming, come on let's go get lunch and then I'll tell you all about it after. Probably in the library, I have some stuff I need to look up."

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	9. Why Thank You

A/N : Going out on a limb here with an idea I haven't seen in the, admittedly limited, fanfiction I've read. If you think it's a bad idea and I'm setting myself up for disaster, let me know. Not that I'm going to not go through with it but I am curious as to any criticism that may arise before I try to tackle the beast.

A/N 2: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 9: Why Thank You

Winter Break was fast approaching and Harry was looking forward to it, though that wasn't to say he didn't enjoy his time at Hogwarts. In fact, between the castle's corridors being decorated with holly and mistletoe, decorated trees in the Great Hall and the several feet of snow layering the grounds, Hogwarts was at its most vibrant. Snow fights, both the muggle way with snowballs and magically with transfigured snow warriors, took place between students on the weekends, Madam Pomfrey was required to provide liberal amounts of Pepper-Up Potion and fires in hearths throughout rooms of the castle cosily burned brighter to compensate for drafty corridors. Furthermore, in their last private lesson of the calendar year, since they wouldn't have one the day before break, Professor Quirrell had broached another proposition with Harry for when they picked up with private lessons again in January.

"You've come along well during the previous term under my tuition, I have taught you the skills required to become a powerful wizard," Professor Quirrell announced to Harry at the end of their lesson on Friday the thirteenth. "Mr. Potter, these are your first steps," he continued. "There is tremendously more powerful magic I can possibly teach you, but you must desire to learn it, I cannot force you. The nature of this magic is, regrettably, frowned upon by weak minded fools who fear others gaining power simply because they themselves do not possess the ability to do so."

It sounded rather dubious but the idea of becoming more powerful was certainly enticing to Harry, he would hear the professor out. "What kind of magic? I want to learn it. It's like you said with _incendio_ , there are people with less potential who don't understand magic," Harry said.

Quirrell gave him a thin approving smile, "this pragmatic branch of magic is unfixed, mutating, indestructible, and accomplished practitioners are more fierce and cleverer than other wizards by far. For the most part it is considered abominable due to its ability to command immense power and a potential to be dangerous, sometimes for they who wield such magic, other times for those who find themselves on the receiving end." Harry was enticed by what he was being told, the professor didn't need to try so hard selling whatever magic he intended to teach him, the possibility of magic being dangerous to himself could easily be dismissed, he was skilled enough to not make stupid mistakes. "The Dark Arts are, unquestionably, the foremost way for a wizard to exhibit power," he finished.

Oh. That explained why Professor Quirrell was giving a long-winded explanation why the magic was so good, Harry thought, certain types of dark magic would get a person thrown into Azkaban. Harry knew Sirius used it during the war, explaining that you had to fight fire with fire, which had made him something of an outcast among those fighting Voldemort, but that didn't change the fact he was one of their most effective fighters. Before he could voice his thoughts and say that he would agree to be taught such magic Professor Quirrell spoke.

"Think about it Mr. Potter, I have no desire to teach someone only committed to learning a meagre portion of capable magic. If you are sure in your decision we will resume lessons in January, do not bother to return otherwise," Quirrell stated before sweeping out of the room, leaving Harry to his thoughts.

Though he was confident in his desire to learn the magic, Harry knew that not heeding the professor's words would be a terrible decision, and if he showed up to the next lesson without being committed Quirrell would give him a thorough thrashing. It was what had happened after one time during Defense class Harry messed up and used his right hand to cast spells when usually using his left, and the professor had noticed. During the next private lesson, Quirrell had beaten Harry ferociously during their duels, to the point where Harry seriously considered going to the hospital wing, before questioning him on why he hadn't displayed his ability as a dualist during their lessons if he truly wanted to become a powerful wizard. That time Harry's explanation had been accepted, with the demand that he never keeps such information from him again, but this time he had been given a proper warning.

Then there was the issue of where would Harry learn the Dark Arts. He'd heard enough from the Slytherins and seen with his own eyes that Dumbledore held a firm control on what was allowed in the library, even in the Restricted Section, so that wasn't an option. There was the possibility he could nick some books from the Black library one of the times he visited, since Sirius had moved a significant portion to his grandfather Arcturus' manor from Grimmauld Place, but if he was caught the repercussions were not something Harry wanted to deal with. Really, the only option was for Professor Quirrell himself to tutor Harry in a departure from their previous hands-off lessons. Maybe that's what Quirrell had meant when he said he had taught Harry the skills required to become a powerful wizard, the ability to research, learn and adapt, and now that he had proven proficient enough at that he would be taught more directly. The thought of finally having shown himself worthy of the professor's dedicated effort made Harry quite jubilant inside.

Another reason that Harry was enjoying the time before the holidays was Sophie's undertaking to finish painting his room before Winter Break. Since the older Slytherins had not yet ceased their attempts to prank the first years, and he was not yet advanced enough to cast wards which people could be keyed into, Harry would have to spend all the time she was painting in the room with her. It was a comfortable atmosphere, often Harry would be sitting at the letter desk reading or working on a spell he wanted to use during his next lesson with Quirrell paying her little mind, sometimes the two of them talked about anything and everything, and once in a while their other friends, Daphne, Blaise and Tracey, would join them and there would be a study session during which everyone would talk over what had been gone over during class recently. Harry considered himself incredibly fortuitous Sophie hadn't gone through with her threat of decorating his bedroom's walls with unicorns, instead going with a rather tasteful depiction of the landscape surrounding Fort Black where Sirius and Sarah's wedding had taken place, the usually vacant but historic castle where the Black family resided during times of old when there was vast conflict but these days there simply weren't enough members of the Black family to justify its inhabitation. Even if Sophie wasn't an amazing painter, yet, and only quite decent, it was an excellent decision as the castle was located on a cliff overlooking the ocean and surrounded by forest, truly giving both the wedding and now Harry's room a magical quality.

Over Winter Break though Harry had many plans, ranging from greatly important to fairly mundane. Though if anyone told him that flying for a significant amount of time was considered mundane he would fervently disagree. The important plans had arisen out of what Harry, and nearly simultaneously Sirius and Tonks, discovered after their adventure a month beforehand. After going recounting what had happened while going down the third floor corridor to Sophie, she and Harry had looked through the Hogwarts library for mentions of magical stones. The conclusion that the Philosopher's Stone was in Sirius' possession was shocking, and Sirius' letter sent the next morning confirming he ' _knew what they were dealing with and would be working through proper channels to meet the right people, maybe_ [he] _and Sophie could even come along_ ' was exciting news. The result of his work being Harry, Sophie, Tonks, Sirius and Sarah had been invited to portkey off to France, where the Flamels lived, on the twenty-ninth.

Before then Harry would celebrate both the wizarding holidays of the Winter Solstice and Yule and muggle Christmas. The Tonkses always spent Christmas Day with Ted's muggle family because it was after the wizarding holidays were celebrated. It was fortunate Harry could look forward to it in past years as he would be surrounded by the Black family, parts of which could be rather unsavoury and disliked him. But this year only Arcturus, his wife Melania and Harry's Great Aunt Cassiopeia would be there, and while they were blunt and rough around the edges they treated him as family. Harry chalked it up to being a characteristic of old people.

During breakfast of the last day of term spirits were high among the Slytherin first years, they only had one Potions class before being finished, and were happily discussing holiday plans. It was an unwritten rule within magical high society that once someone was attending Hogwarts they were allowed to attend social events, nothing official having to do with the Ministry, but family hosted festivities were acceptable, meaning the purebloods in Harry's year were buzzing with excitement.

"Harry, do you think you'll be attending our Ball on the twenty-third? Lord Black has responded saying he will attend, will you be accompanying him? He didn't say in his letter to my father," Daphne asked while reading through a letter she had received in the post that morning. Her family was the Most Ancient House around which the neutral alliance in the Wizengamot, which Sirius as Lord Black had joined after reforming the Black family, revolved and had done so for decades, meaning there were expectations of them to host such events.

"Seeing as I didn't receive an invitation, I'm going to be required to respectfully decline," Harry replied, following the mannerism guidelines Andromeda had taught him.

"Humph, well, I'll see about that," she said in a promising tone.

"Actually Harry, I was wondering," Sophie began questioningly before pausing. "It doesn't look like I will be able to convince my parents to allow me to attend festivities with Aunt Sarah. You'll be my guest for the Malfoy Ball, I'd take a muggleborn if I thought I could get away with it, but you'll have to do."

Harry, who was perfectly okay with being a statement to Sophie's parents as a half-blood, put his hands over his heart and with a faux emotionally wounded tone and look upon his face declared, "you wound me, Sophie! I'll have to do? Why I've never been insulted so!" Then in a more serious tone, "that sounds fine." He hadn't told her about Dora's teasing and there was assuredly more to come now unfortunately, he thought.

At this time Hedwig made an entrance, doing two loops around the Great Hall as if showing off how incredibly beautiful of an owl she was, before landing in front of Harry at the Slytherin table. "Yes, we all know how very vain you are, Hedwig," Harry told his owl. She gave an indignant bark in return but allowed Harry to take the letter, written to him by Sirius, from her. Hedwig hopped over to Sophie since she had a letter for her as well and received a slice of bacon from the girl for her efforts before flying off. "Bloody hell, that's not good," Harry commented while reading through the letter. Knowing his companions would want an explanation he continued, "Great Uncle Arcturus has dragonpox. I'll tell you more on the way to class." Which was a subtle way of saying he didn't want to talk about it in the open.

The four of them, Blaise had also come along, piled into the second year potions classroom just down the hall from theirs. "What's going on?" Daphne asked.

"You'll want to hear this Daphne, though I'm sure your father already knows. Just before falling ill Arcturus and Melania attended a theatre production and socialised with, as he put it, 'the old crowd' and Sirius says that means it's all the older generation of Dark families. Apparently, if something happens to them," implying they would all get sick and die, "a lot of those supposed to inherit Wizengamot seats are far more fanatic in supporting their beliefs, and the balance of power will shift into Lord Malfoy's alliance's favour," Harry informed them.

"Hmm," was Blaise's only response, his family was Italian and his mother, the first generation in Britain, had not yet established enough clout to be involved with politics.

Sophie's response was a look of worry and a murmur of, "grandmother."

Daphne, on the other hand, appeared to be plotting. "The supremacists in Slytherin are going to be much worse if that happens. We have to do something."

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Checking himself after stepping out of the floo in Grimmauld Place Harry was pleased to find he retained the skill of being able to not be covered in soot after a trip through the system. Tomorrow was the day of the Winter Solstice, a major holiday in the wizarding world since a magician was considerably more in touch with magic, and it was celebrated with family while taking part in traditions and rituals. For the Black family, which Harry was an honorary member of, the traditions meant a day of fasting while decorating a Yule tree with lights and symbols of the sun, heading to bed congruently as the sun set, followed by rising just before first light to ignite a large fire and enjoy an enormous breakfast, celebrating the beginning of winter and lengthening days. The rituals varied upon what outcome was desired and from family to family, the ministry approved rituals having been abolished years ago, but under Sirius the Blacks only performed the most rudimentary of them since a majority of the rituals were black magic (a category of the Dark Arts which required a sacrifice, of anything from fruits and vegetables to blood to a life) and he thoroughly disapproved of such magic. Every year his views resulted in a loud and drawn out argument with the rest of the family, sans Andromeda who supported him but due to her temporary disownment couldn't speak up. Harry thought it was a little extreme, the rituals could be highly beneficial, and something as harmless as the Samhain letter burning ritual could technically be considered black magic, by strict definition.

Usually they celebrated at the Black Manor where the eldest generation of Blacks lived, but due to the dragonpox crisis, they were celebrating at Grimmauld Place. This was for two reasons, the primary being it was assumed Black Manor as a whole had been contaminated and secondarily since it was only Sirius and Sarah, Remus, the Tonkses and Harry they would be able to be in close proximity to each other without curses flying, both magical and verbal. Festivities began with an abundant meal the night before the solstice.

Conversation flowed idly and Harry was describing how easy classes were for him when Sirius broke in, "you know Harry, I've been talking with several parents about seeing if we could get some type of ministerial oversight in Hogwarts. How do you think the students would react?"

"I'm not sure. As long as everyone was allowed to keep to their own devices it'd be fine. It's not that the classes aren't good, I just study ahead," Harry told the table, suppressing the urge to shrug since this was a 'formal' meal.

"It has more to do with the trolls on Samhain and the third floor corridor. Things like that simply cannot be allowed in Hogwarts. It's the Board of Governors' job, but they're all under either Lucius' or Albus' thumb, even Augusta Longbottom is, somehow I doubt much will get done," Sirius related in a tired tone. "I haven't talked about what we've actually found on the third floor until we've visited the Flamels, but they didn't seem too worried so I doubt it'll be an issue."

"I still like my plan of it being a group of representatives, one from the Education Department, one an Auror from the DMLE and an Undersecretary. Then, letting the _Prophet_ know what was there so they publish the story the same morning you propose it to the Wizengamot it'll be fresh on everyone's minds," Sarah said.

"It's a lovely plan but I'll, unfortunately, have to use this as a bargaining chip to prevent a well-intentioned but awfully executed idea of Albus'. He wants to promote international relations, which is all well and good, but doing it through the Tri-Wizard Tournament is just asking for trouble," Sirius declared.

The well-read members sitting at the table, Remus, Sarah and Andromeda, had some form of shocked reaction upon hearing that. Harry's eyebrows rose significantly as well, he only knew about the tournament because one of his ancestors had actually won it centuries ago.

For Ted and Dora, Sarah explained, "it is a competition between Hogwarts, Beauxbatons and Durmstrang who submit a student to compete in three highly dangerous tasks, usually resulting in an excessive number of deaths. Really, it has been done away with several times, and in my opinion should stay that way. There has to be some alternative."

"What about an exchange program?" Ted asked candidly as if it was the obvious answer.

"A what now?" Sirius asked while everyone else looked on intently.

"An exchange, you switch spots for a predetermined amount of time. For example, one of the guys I work with at the station went and lived with a family in the States while a boy from the family he was staying with lived with his family, they switched spots," Ted informed them.

"Oh," Andromeda said. "So in this instance Hogwarts would send out, I don't know, ten students. Five would go to each of the other schools, and receive ten in return?" Ted nodded that she had the rights of it. To Harry, going to a different school sounded like it would be an unnecessary hassle, he'd rather just stay at Hogwarts.

"You think Albus will let his students go off to Durmstrang? They teach the Dark Arts there, he'll do anything to not allow that to happen," Sirius said. Upon hearing that Harry decided this needed a look into, after Professor Quirrell's lessons he didn't know where he would learn dark magic if the rumoured Defense Teacher Curse struck. If the Dark Arts were as powerful as Quirrell said they were, he would want to keep researching them.

"Which is why you have the bargaining chip," Sarah reminded him.

"Right, I've got to get on that after the holidays. Malfoy's alliance has finally stopped braying over the law concerning cursing muggle objects passing, I can focus on it," Sirius mused.

"By the way, I ran into Arthur Weasley the other day, he told me he's more than willing to sleep through the day so when it goes into effect on August first he'll be ready for any raids they'll do and to pass on his thanks for giving his office more power to do their job," Dora said.

"Good to hear," Sirius proclaimed. "Since we're talking about politics, Harry, have you had any thoughts on getting the Potters a seat on the Wizengamot?"

"Only a few. I think it's a good idea, really, after being in Slytherin I can see how it wouldn't really be that hard, and I think they'd want me to," Harry said referring to his parents, and Sirius gave a solemn nod in agreement. "And remember what you said in your letter? Daphne, Greengrass that is, thinks that the blood purists who were making a stink on Samhain are going to get worse, so I'll probably end up doing politics whether I want to or not," Harry said.

"You'll get plenty of practice playing nice with those people on Monday at the Malfoy Ball," Andromeda reminded him.

Harry groaned.

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The Malfoy Ball was proceeding relatively well in Harry's opinion and while he was treated coolly without often being approached for a conversation he'd expected to be dismissed out of hand, but everyone was quite civil and there was no obvious politicking going on. Harry knew the real political talks would occur the next night at the Ministry's Ball, but as an outsider he thought he'd be challenged eventually. While they were sitting at an out of the way table he voiced his thoughts to Sophie, only to hear a scoff come from behind them. They turned to see Lisa Turpin along with several other Ravenclaw girls from older years sitting there.

"Please, Potter. No one wants to get on the bad side of the godson of the man who reorganised the Ministry and more or less has Minister Shafiq in his eternal debt for getting him elected. Though there were rumours it was more Arcturus Black's work, which is logical considering his long political history, but the current Lord Black still reaps the benefits. You can be thankful nearly everyone here has no desire to give him more political capital," one of the older girls explained. Harry knew Sirius was politically powerful, but not to that extent, and it was a good thing Sirius was too noble to use his power for entirely selfish reasons.

"Also," Turpin said with a speculative glance in Harry's direction, "your magical ability has been noticed by many. You can be sure every student worth their salt let their families know about it. They don't want to alienate you until you do something wrong." Harry internally swelled as he learned his power was being acknowledged, and he'd only gone to Hogwarts for one term. He'd cackle if he could, with Professor Quirrell's lessons he was well on his way to being the most magically gifted student of his generation.

With a unsuppressed snort, Sophie said, "whoops. Guess I should be eating bland food then," causing a small wave of mirth throughout those listening.

The oldest of the other group spoke up, "regardless, keep up the good work trying to fit in with the purebloods, Potter. It'll get you places."

While Harry wanted to say he would get where he wanted on his own merits it wasn't a good idea to cause a scene, although could agree that Sophie and he appeared to be perfect purebloods. She was dressed in a gown which at first glance was frivolous but after looking at it for a while was quite elegant, the main white colored portions outlined with black highlights which gave the dress its busy appearance, while Harry himself was wearing black dress robes with white highlights since Sarah and Andromeda had coordinated with Sophie. It didn't hurt they acted traditionally either, it wasn't a conscious decision other than acknowledging this was a formal social event, they had both been raised with traditionalist mannerisms and the other attendees respected that. He danced a few times with Sophie when they were tired of sitting around, one time Harry accidently nearly steered them into Sophie's older brother Aaron, from whom Harry received a glare of loathing.

"He wanted to duel you, you know? Stupid older brothers, going a whole school term together without saying a single word to you but the moment you decide to invite someone to a Ball so you aren't bored out of your mind they're upset," Sophie bemoaned.

"I'm not sure older sisters are much better," Harry commented, thinking of Dora's endless pranks and teasing.

Sophie cocked her head to the side in what could be considered agreement or letting the comment pass by. "The worst part though was everyone else agreed there was no reasonable excuse to bring a half-blood to a ball, I was overstepping my bounds causing damage to the family and would have to either go alone or with a pureblood," she said.

"So what happened? You said he wanted to duel me. What'd you do?" Harry asked.

"Basically that I could go live with Aunt Sarah whenever I wanted. If they didn't want me I could leave at any time and they could deal with the scandal," Sophie said somewhat sorrowfully.

"Just like Sirius, huh? Do you think you'll ever have to actually do it?"

"Maybe if things get a lot worse, but I doubt I'll ever be cursed like Walburga did to him. The worst I can see them doing is grounding me, locking me in my room with a house elf delivering meals. I figure if that happens, they'll let me out for Hogwarts and then I'll be able to arrange to just go to Grimmauld Place during breaks," she explained. Harry agreed it wasn't a bad plan.

At ten that night it was time for those still Hogwarts age to leave, so Harry and Sophie headed to the floo reminiscing about the most interesting occurrence from all night, which had occurred just before then. "It wasn't that bad, was it? I thought I did a good job by not cursing him," Harry proclaimed.

Still laughing lightly, Sophie replied, "it's more the fact you didn't curse him that's so funny. Think about it, the host's son tries to cause a scene to discredit you but then you treat him like he doesn't warrant your attention. So he obviously gets mad and storms off to get his father to put you in your place, but his mum finds him first and tells him to not do anything and neither will his father. Ignoring her he tries to get you to duel him and when you don't he pulls his wand on you to curse you but you see it from a mile away and block it. Thus, the Malfoy family is publicly embarrassed and you look as dignified as ever."

"Alright, alright!" Harry said with a slight chuckle as they arrived at the fireplace. "I guess I'll see you Saturday for our trip to France?"

"Hm, maybe before then. I'm going out with Dora on Thursday, I might see you then," Sophie told him, though Harry doubted he would as he had every intention to spend some quality time flying. With a hug, they said their goodbyes before taking some floo powder and subsequently disappearing in flashes of green flames.

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"Ugghh," was the only sound Harry could make, barely standing and holding in his breakfast, as he along with Sophie, Dora, Sarah and Sirius were deposited from a rather violent international portkey.

Orienting themselves, the group looked around and took in their lavish surroundings. They had landed in a large gazebo located next to a rapidly running river which was in the bottom of a valley between several green hills that were spotted with various plants and trees. On top of one they could see the side of a large manor going three stories up, on another the top of several greenhouses could be seen. Starting at the gazebo going off in all directions was a connecting network of stone paths, and at the moment two elderly people were descending along the one leading to the manor to greet them. Both of them had long white hair with not even a hint of balding, were wearing modern outfits though had forgone the traditional robes popular within the wizarding world and had merry, welcoming expressions on their faces.

"Welcome to our not so humble abode. As you probably know, I'm Perenelle Flamel and it is wonderful to see so many vivacious young faces," she said with a measured British accent.

Introductions went around and once everyone was acquainted Nicolas spoke up, "come, let us give you a tour of the grounds. So few come here it is truly a pleasure to show people around. We can deal with business later."

The Flamel's estate was enormous and everything was maintained flawlessly, Harry along with everyone else was blown away. Nothing was second rate, there were ten greenhouses filled with everything from bananas to witch's ganglion (an incredibly rare plant from the Far East, Nicolas told them), the horse stables were immaculate, another gazebo provided an enticing view of a mountain range in the distance and finally the manor itself which was filled with paintings and artefacts from bygone eras, but that the Flamels had probably lived through. Finally settling down after an exquisite late lunch, Nicolas turned to them with an interested expression while Perenelle looked on with one of mirth.

"So, what exactly has become of the so-called Philosopher's Stone through Albus' folly?" he asked.

Sirius reached into his pocket and withdrew a bag of silk, taking the blood red stone out of it to place it on the table. "It was placed in Hogwarts Castle, where any able student could get to it. I imagine if given the proper incentive even a group of first years could get past the tests to reach it. I'm not quite sure what Albus was thinking, only using an alert ward when there are so many other wards which could be used."

"Indeed?" Perenelle asked. "I had thought we gave it to him so he could research it, not let it sit around doing nothing," she said.

"That we did, though knowing Albus he may not desire the power you could obtain from creating a stone, nor possess the desire to go through the process of making one," Nicolas replied. To Harry that sounded dubious and of ill omens where the stone was concerned, glancing around it seemed the others shared his thoughts.

"Why did you give it up in the first place?" Sarah asked instead. "I would think you needed it in relatively close proximity to obtain the Elixir of Life."

"You see, a stone can only be used so many times. It requires to be, for lack of a better word, charged in order to be of any benefit and currently the stone does not have any power left. At this time it is simply a gem which has had immense amounts of magic in it at one time. I suppose I should inform you we also have no plans to continue to use the stone for either of its abilities, it has served its purpose," Nicolas said.

Perenelle continued, "therefore we gave it to the person who had the highest chance of discovering what gave it the power we have used for centuries." That made a lot of sense to Harry, but there was one problem.

"So… So, you're just going to die now?" Dora asked.

"I doubt it. I was seventy when we finished the stone, so I will probably live for another twenty years at minimum," Nicolas informed them. "The purpose was to live to see the year of two thousand and watch how the world developed, it shouldn't be an issue, and to us, after being in this world for so long it will be nice to finally rest." Everyone looked baffled at their casual acceptance of death, and Perenelle noticed.

"You are all so young, maybe once you have spent a century in this world you will understand, at times it is easy to be weary of living," she said.

"I actually think Arcturus and Melania are thinking such, they don't seem to be fighting the dragonpox, I doubt they'll make it to the new year," Sirius said sadly. This was news to Harry and Dora, but this wasn't the time to mourn their dying Great Uncle and Aunt.

After an extended silence, Nicolas spoke, "I suggest you refrain from mentioning your possession of the stone until Albus deems it necessary to inform us. Who knows what that man has cooked up, he usually has a decent reason for doing things that appear outlandish. Who knows?"

"Sure, we can do that," Sirius said. "Right?" he asked while looking at everyone else and received a series of nods in agreement.

"You mentioned Albus wouldn't 'possess the desire to go through the process of making one.' What do you mean by that? If you don't mind telling us, that is," Sarah asked.

"Ah, the magic used to create the Philosopher's Stone would, these days, be considered black magic," Nicolas answered. Sirius, who the stone was right in front of on the table, nearly jumped back while pushing the stone away from him as if just being near it would infect him.

Perenelle snorted. "Yes, black magic can have adverse effects but I assure you, we wouldn't make such mistakes. It was a precise calculation and determined to be refined to a degree of stability such to prevent them."

Sarah looked to be caught in between wanting to know more and never wanting to concern herself with such subjects ever again. Dora and Sirius were sitting with slight frowns on their faces. Sophie looked like she didn't really care either way. Harry himself was interested to know more, learning how to get unlimited gold and immortality couldn't hurt, that was for sure.

Paying them little heed Nicolas ploughed on, "I will tell you the method of magic used to create the stone, and leave it at that. Come, let us walk and talk, I imagine you have your lives to get on with." Acknowledging the invitation to leave for what it was, everyone prepared to head to the gazebo.

"Now the stone uses a branch of magic that is still in sparse use today, though for much more mundane things than we have used it. It uses Blood Alchemy, strictly black magic, as you are required to sacrifice an equivalent of what you desire to change," Nicolas announced. "For a famous example, in order for Salazar Slytherin's descendants to all possess the skill of parseltongue he sacrificed a whole family line. The fact he sacrificed a dying old man is often overlooked, eternally labelling the ability as dark." Hearing that Harry wondered where he got his parseltongue ability from, as far as his mum knew in her diaries Tom Riddle was a muggleborn. Maybe one of his ancestors was from a squib line? Though there were known groups of parselmouths in Greece, India and the Americas.

Sirius though stumbled upon hearing Nicolas' announcement. "You- you- killed all those people? Just to live longer?"

"Indeed," Perenelle told him. "Though they were worthless criminals. They were deserving of death."

Arriving at the gazebo which they'd arrived in, the atmosphere was much more subdued this time. Sirius and Dora looked almost eager to leave, while Sophie, Sarah and Harry held themselves together slightly better but still unnerved by what they had learned.

Handing them the same portkey they arrived with, Nicolas spoke, "I will write to you once Albus has contacted us about the stone." He waited until everyone was touching the portkey before saying, "so long now," and the five visitors were swept away in a flash of blue light.

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	10. Bigger Than Me

A/N : In some of the stories I've read there will be a character who will 'swear on his magic' in order to affirm they are telling the truth, or some shit like that. In my story, swearing on your magic means literally nothing. It's like, if you swear to God and whatever you say is wrong, you're not going to feel the wrath of God and instantaneously burst into raging hellfire. So yeah.

A/N 2: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 10: Bigger Than Me

While spring was slowly giving way to summer the students of Hogwarts were inundated with a massive increase in homework. Harry didn't really mind that much, since all the material was basically review for him at this point, between his preparation for a magical education last summer and his diligence during the year he was far ahead of his peers. What did worry Harry, however, were the four other students with whom he would need to compete for the top academic spot of their year. The only class the Slytherins had with the Gryffindors was Potions but Harry knew through observation and inquiry that Hermione Granger was a force to be reckoned with in regards to academics with the effort she put in. Anthony Goldstein and Lisa Turpin, whom as Ravenclaws Harry shared the majority of classes with, were both incredibly bright and had a strong academic drive, while Harry, and he imagined Granger, saw knowledge as a means to an end these two simply wanted to learn for the sake of learning, practically living in the library. Finally there was Tracey, his housemate who had probably started the year off knowing less magic than the muggleborns, since they were given introductory information, but through sheer force of will established herself as one of the more knowledgeable and magically capable students in the first two years, like Harry she had made it a priority to study ahead.

"Why don't you try harder at school?" Harry asked Sophie one day while he was working on a History essay that she had only done an acceptable job on.

She thought of how to word her response for a moment, "magic is cool and all, but school is just school. I know, that you know, that I know a lot more than I put into essays and whatnot. I figure as long as I'm sure I know all I need to well enough for the exams, the essays are just repetitive. Then I can spend more time catching up to you, you nerd," Sophie teased. She finished with a question, "why do you try so hard at school?"

"For one, my mum was always top of her class. I'm pretty sure if she was still here she would encourage me to be so as well," Harry told her sadly. "Also, people respect achievements. If I keep doing what I am, I'll be respected and it'll be a lot easier to do politics later. So they would've wanted me to do it for that reason too. Oh, and, she may not act like it but Dora is wicked smart, so if I don't do well I'll be the disappointment in the family."

"I know, she was telling me how hard it is to become an Auror. Bloody hell it's a lot of work. It sounded intriguing, though," Sophie said.

"Something you're interested in?" Harry asked.

"Maybe. I mean, Dora's cool and she likes it. Besides, she told me that because I do art I'd especially have a really good critical eye to look over crime scenes and stuff, and it'd also probably help with concealment and disguise. Which is pretty cool," Sophie mused. "It's not like I want to go into the family business selling rugs, the only reason I would is if I could do grandfather's job, travelling the world finding rugs to import. Or I could paint. I think if I had to do it for money it wouldn't be as fun, though, I like it more as a hobby."

"Maybe you could convince him to take you as an apprentice of sorts, train you for when he doesn't want to do it anymore," Harry offered.

"I wish. But he's set on Aaron since he 'has some quick acting business spunk' apparently," Sophie said, changing her voice to a poor imitation of her grandfather's while quoting him.

"That's bollocks," Harry declared. He sighed and said, "I'm not going to get anything more done on this essay at the moment, if you're going to be an Auror your duelling skills will have to be top notch. Want to go a few rounds?"

"Definitely, let's go."

Over the school year the two of them duelled once or twice a week in an out of the way room they'd found on the fifth floor, it was an enjoyable activity to do in their downtime. Even if Harry was much better than Sophie he was teaching her what Professor Quirrell had taught him during the private lessons. She was, much like Harry himself, an intuitive duellist and when Harry described how spells could be used unconventionally to produce unexpected effects she'd gotten quite creative, making their duels consistently interesting and keeping Harry on his toes. Though he explicitly did not teach her any of the Dark Arts he'd been learning for several months now as he had no idea how to explain where he learned it all, and furthermore, Harry had grown somewhat wary of Quirrell.

His suspicion was sparked after the troll incident but the way he talked about the Dark Arts and the benefits of immersing oneself within them was off-putting, no matter how much power they promised, however Harry played along because he did not want Quirrell to be suspicious of him in turn. Another factor was the gradual degradation of the professor's physical attributes, as if a curse was affecting him. Over the year he'd become increasingly pale and thin, taking on a sickly appearance, his movements were slower now than in September and his reactions were lethargic and more delayed. Whatever was hindering Professor Quirrell, Harry hoped it wouldn't cause him any problems.

Despite his ills, Quirrell's lessons were as informative as ever and continued to push Harry's magical development to the limit. Much of the winter and spring terms had been dedicated to learning both the Dark Arts and what had been labelled 'dark magic', the difference being that the Dark Arts, which included true dark magic, required genuine malicious intent and desire to inflict damage in order to work while so-called 'dark magic' was dangerous for any number of reasons, from being exceptionally dangerous and powerful to incredibly volatile.

For Harry this meant that while using the Dark Arts he had to pretend Professor Quirrell was a Death Eater, and while he suspected it may have fueled his wariness of the professor it provided him with enough anger to fuel the spells, not to mention he relished in the feeling of power which flooded through him afterwards, there was something enticingly primal about them. Meanwhile, when performing some of the spells Quirrell had taught him which the Ministry had classified as dark Harry made sure to stay as focused as possible, lest something go wrong. Before he had begun learning he thought to himself this wouldn't be an issue, he was skilled enough to not make pitiful mistakes, but he had been so very wrong. For example, there was a curse which Harry liked to think of as a much more concentrated banishing charm that caused a small area to be significantly damaged called the Sledgehammer Curse, and when he was first learning the spell it had a tendency to explode just after leaving his wand, blasting Harry backwards. This was why it was 'dark', both dangerous to hit other people with and for the caster.

"What are you doing wrong?" Professor Quirrell had demanded the second time it occurred.

"Nothing! I have the incantation, the wand movements and intent for it to work," Harry nearly snapped, frustrated with his failure.

"Intent to what?"

"To hit you of course," Harry actually snapped this time.

"Intent to hit me? With what? A puffskein? Oranges? Your shoe?" Quirrell asked bitingly. "Mr. Potter, when working with magic this powerful your intent cannot be so foolishly vague. Your spell has enough power, obviously, but your intent simply 'to hit' does not propel it anywhere. So you see, your spells are actually imploding because you're putting all this force behind the spell but not supporting it to direct it anywhere. Therefore, you must desire for the curse to do severe damage to my body. I assure you, you will not hurt me. Intent to bludgeon, shatter bones, mangle flesh and maim organs is required. Nothing less will suffice," he explained. Fixing Harry with a penetrating look he asked, "can you do that Mr. Potter? Or are you weak, like the rest?"

Listening to his professor's explanation, Harry fortified himself to begin casting the spell once again. Apparently, the Sledgehammer Curse was where the lines blurred between what were the Dark Arts and magic tagged as 'dark'. Hearing the last words spoken by Quirrell angered him, he wasn't weak! Bringing his wand to bear, Harry cast while getting up from his seat on the floor, " _percussus_!" This time it worked, a purple spell leaving Harry's ebony wand and rocketing across the classroom.

Quirrell instantaneously levitated a log, which was part of the conjured environment in use today, into the path of the spell. When it made contact a large dent was made on the side facing Harry, but with a loud _crack_ the back blew out, showering the professor in splinters. Silently banishing the log towards Harry, who caught it with a spell from the elm wand in his right hand while simultaneously casting another offensive spell with his left, Quirrell calmly spoke, "and that is why this spell is good to know. The gouging charm merely goes through an object, the banishing charm not dense enough without significant concentration and the blasting hex or reductor curse have some form of explosion." Smoothly untransfiguring the oversized rabbit Harry had sent at him back into the log, he instructed, "only cast that spell now, until you are sure to perform it without fail."

The lessons continued in that vein for the remainder of the school year, Quirrell would teach Harry a spell, he would work on it until it was ingrained into both his brain and magic, and then the two of them would duel while Harry incorporated the spell into his arsenal somehow. It was fairly efficient and by their last private lesson, Harry was confident in his ability to hold his own against wizards far older than he in a fight. Though, probably not someone who was trained like Dora as an Auror or Sirius as a Hit-Wizard. He was capably versed in the Dark Arts, Professor Quirrell had informed him back in January they would focus on them more than anything else because knowledge on dark magic was severely limited, while he could learn conventional magic just about anywhere on his own time.

Today was the last Friday before exams and their final private lesson. After healing his visible wounds and hitting his clothes with several _reparo_ s so it didn't look like he'd been duelling in them, he had to do this after every lesson as the magic holding them together would fade over a week, Professor Quirrell deemed him worthy of some parting guidance.

"Two pieces of advice Mr. Potter, before we go our separate ways. Firstly, on the seventh floor you will find a tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy attempting to teach trolls ballet, pace past it thrice thinking repeatedly of finding the lost and found, and the entrance will be revealed. There you will find items stored for centuries, but most importantly a wide selection of literature that will interest you may be found. I suggest keeping this room secret, not many know of it, I doubt even the Headmaster does. Use it well," he informed. Harry knew immediately he and Sophie would quite enjoy exploring the room, especially if, like Professor Quirrell said, it held everything ever lost at Hogwarts over centuries.

"Secondly, I have been profoundly generous, tutoring you throughout the year and giving you the tools you so desperately sought to become a more powerful wizard. In the future, there will come a time when your skills will be required. I suggest you answer the call of my … associate, you will not like the consequences otherwise," the second portion was said in a highly threatening tone that confirmed Quirrell was indeed a very dangerous wizard and sent shivers along Harry's spine.

Before Harry could even figure out how to respond to that, if at all, the professor left the room with the listless gait he'd developed, leaving the boy thinking he was in way over his head, his suspicions over the recent months crashing over him in waves. Was Quirrell going to try to become a new dark lord or something? Did he only train Harry so he could become his figurative bludger, to hurt others? But it wasn't like he could talk to anyone about it, he'd been learning the Dark Arts from Professor Quirrell for six months now! Slowly making his way back to the Slytherin Common Room to shower, change and begin final revising for the exams he would take over the next two weeks, Harry resolved he wouldn't stop getting better and training, until he could defend himself and his family from whatever may come.

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Harry didn't sleep much that night, but fortunately, it was easily passed off as preparing for the exams as the majority of the school looked similarly tired. Hedwig also arrived with a letter in the post on Saturday morning from Sirius, which was a sure way to cheer Harry up. The letter had details of Sirius' political maneuverings, unnecessary reassurance that the first year exams didn't really matter much and a small note that the Flamels hadn't contacted him yet.

"Any news?" Sophie asked as she settled onto the bench across from him.

Feeling safe his reply wouldn't be overheard in the noisy Great Hall, Harry answered, "yeah, Karkaroff's going to be out of a job at the end of the year. Good for Sirius getting that to be a condition of the exchange program, his reaction to learning that Death Eater was Headmaster was not very good."

"Aunt Sarah mentioned. And what of Beauxbatons and the Board of Governors?" Sophie asked.

"Beauxbatons was glad to endorse it, especially considering the last time the tournament was held at their school a cockatrice got loose apparently injuring loads of people and doing a lot of damage. The Board was hesitant at first, something to do with getting rid of tradition, but Sirius thinks they're coming around. He says half the reason for it is because they'll have way less paperwork to do. The main problem now is Dumbledore, like Sirius thought he's opposed to sending students to Durmstrang where they may fall in with the Dark Arts and his allied board members are following his lead," Harry informed her.

After hearing of the possibility of being able to attend a different school Sophie and Harry had researched the two others and their differences from Hogwarts. Beauxbatons taught more theory of magic than Hogwarts, at the sacrifice of less practical work and not teaching as much advanced magic, while it also had a wider variety of speciality elective courses. One of these was a class focusing how to create magical paintings, which Sophie was interested in. On the other side of the spectrum was Durmstrang, solely focused on the practical applications of magic with the theory almost as an afterthought, if the students wanted to learn theory they could on their own time, according to several sources. It was far harsher as well in both climate, being located in the far north, and culture, with a sink or swim attitude, since it was an invite-only school if someone couldn't cope they were heavy-handedly encouraged to depart for one of the lesser schools scattered around continental Europe. Harry, who was tentatively thinking of going to Durmstrang because of the promotion of learning advanced material and their open tolerance of the Dark Arts, wasn't sure if he wanted to deal with those difficulties, but as he'd been told, the best potions are brewed over flame.

Exams went off without a hitch for Harry, there was only a week of school left during which teachers would assign summer homework and briefly touch on what material could be expected next year. Hogwarts would've settled into a lazy mood, except for the fact the very day after exams were over the Boy-Who-Lived and his friend Ron Weasley were in the hospital wing, and Professor Quirrell had disappeared. Harry briefly wondered if he had told anyone of his fears it could have been prevented, but ultimately decided the consequences wouldn't have been worth it. The rumours Harry heard before the morning post had even arrived were quite diverse but the most popular one was that something had happened within the third floor corridor, which Harry found almost believable. He was also glad the Philosopher's Stone was long gone by now so Quirrell had no chance to get his hands on it, even if it was powerless at this point.

After the post arrived, in which Hedwig delivered Sophie and Harry's weekly letters from Sirius and Sarah, though they hadn't contained any mention of the Flamels, Dumbledore stood and made his way to the dais from which he'd made his start of term announcements. "I am sorry to announce that Quirinus Quirrell is no longer a resident of this castle. He attempted to steal a research project of mine from the forbidden third floor corridor. Disgraced, he has fled," he told the students with a grave tone and a disappointed look on his face. Then with a more serious gaze and tone implored them, "a group of students were involved in stopping him. I ask you to preserve their privacy, they have done this school a great service."

So Dumbledore went with the actual reason the Flamels had given him the Stone as a cover story, Harry thought sharing a glance with Sophie. He wondered if Sirius would get word from the Flamels and if he would, or could since they may not inform him of the details, tell Harry exactly what went on between the elderly couple and Dumbledore. It certainly seemed amusing in his imagination. The next morning, Sirius' owl arrived with a thick letter. It was Sunday so the hall was relatively empty, therefore Harry pocketed it and with a nod of his head towards the doors indicated they would read it once they left, thankful that Blaise and Daphne were off down the table socialising with some older Slytherins.

The letter was rather humorous, even without what Sirius' imagination had cooked up as to how events played out. "The thought of Dumbledore being 'chastised like an errant child' for not letting someone know their stuff's gone," Sophie chuckled.

"You have to imagine, though, in comparison to the Flamels everyone pretty much is a child. Sirius' idea of Perenelle chasing Dumbledore around with a cane is golden, and completely possible, she is one scary woman."

"The comment about the Stone being here and in a fairly obvious place to distract from anyone who wanted to harm Longbottom, what do you think of that? Wouldn't the wards protect from those things?"

"I dunno if the wards are as strong as they're fabled to be. Remember the trolls? And Sirius and Dora got in without anyone noticing, though that was on the day of a quidditch match. Of course, the wards are good, but not perfect," Harry surmised. "Anyway," he continued, "he is right about the bludger attack justifying his actions."

Conceding his point, Sophie laughed, "I think my favourite part is that they never told Dumbledore how they got the stone back, because he'll be wondering about it for the next forever and a half, and that he 'needs to lighten up.'"

"Sirius will tell him eventually because of the Durmstrang thing. From the letter it sounds like they don't know Longbottom was involved, and he will probably tell his grandmother which will make it useless, unfortunately. Think we should tell him?"

"It'll only be useless if she tells everyone else though, which is what Sirius would have to threaten to do. But let's tell him anyway, maybe she'll help him with that committee he was trying to get going," Sophie concluded.

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Considering the recent revelations about Quirrell's character, Harry was hesitant to investigate the lost and found room he'd been told about. There was every possibility it could be a trap, or he could come across a cursed object he wouldn't have the skills to deal with it or Merlin knew what. Although he knew Quirrell was still out there biding his time, and Harry had every inclination to get on with continuing his magical studies, he deserved a break with some time to relax. Consequently, Harry joined the throngs of students spending their time along the sloping grassy hills leading to the lake with Hogwarts castle towering behind them, enjoying the sun, looking back at the school year and discussing summer plans.

"Guh, I cannot wait to be a second year so we don't have to put up with the pranks from Slytherin anymore!" Daphne declared, after reverting her hair back from being literal green grass. "The Weasley's are bad enough to deal with. Is being safe walking through the common room too much to ask for?"

"Apparently," Sophie drawled. Her hair had previously been charmed into dreadlock-like ropes, giving her a scary appearance. "Unfortunately we can't all be like Harry, seeing where pranks will be before they even happen."

"Hey, let's see you try having Sirius for a godfather, Remus as an uncle and Dora as an older sister! Honestly, the school year is practically tame to the things I'll get into over the summer. I swear on my magic I'll get woken up by a No-Flame Firework tossed through my window and a gravity inversion illusion in the hallway on Sunday morning," Harry lamented.

"Sirius, as in the Lord Black? That does sound rather deplorable," Daphne noted. Then she asked, "what else is everyone doing for summer? I cannot wait to ride horses around the farm again. By far my favourite way to travel, even if brooms are faster nowadays."

"I will split my time between Italy and Britain. I am never sure as to my mother's plans," Blaise said in his cultured voice.

"I think we're being tutored by Remus again. Right, Harry?" Sophie asked, and he nodded, it had been in his last letter. "Other than that, probably spending as much time out of the house at Grimmauld Place as possible. Sirius said he's a studio set up for me!" she proclaimed excitedly.

The three other heads swivelled in Harry's direction. "I heard there are a chaser and seeker position opening on the quidditch team. I'll be flying a lot because I want to become the Chaser. I noticed over Winter Break that I lost some endurance and stuff, so I have to make up for not flying at all this year."

"Malfoy's going to try to become the seeker, allegedly," Blaise mentioned.

"I hope not. I'd rather not deal with the annoying bugger, even if he has left me alone since that fiasco at his Ball," Harry said, causing a round of chuckles. "Still, if he does, I just want to play quidditch."

"Wasn't your dad a chaser?" Sophie asked softly.

"Yeah. Yeah, he was, and captain for his sixth and seventh years too. I hope I'm as good as him," Harry replied.

When the End-of-Term Feast finally came around the residents of Hogwarts were buzzing with anticipatory energy, and Slytherin was nearly bursting with exuberance, breaking the usual decorum they held themselves with, because they would be winning the House Cup for the seventh year in a row. Talk throughout the hall came to an abrupt halt when the Boy-Who-Lived made his first public appearance since the third-floor debacle everyone assumed he'd been in. A moment later, Dumbledore once again approached his dais for announcements, drawing the attention of the room.

He raised his arms in welcome and cheerfully announced, "another year gone! And I must trouble you with an old man's wheezing waffle before we sink our teeth into our delicious feast. What a year it has been! Hopefully your heads are all a little fuller than they were … you have the whole summer ahead to get them nice and empty before next year starts.

"Now, as I understand it the House Cup here needs awarding and the points stand thus: in fourth place, Gryffindor, with three hundred and twelve points; in third, Hufflepuff, with three hundred and fifty-two; Ravenclaw have four hundred and twenty-six and Slytherin, four hundred and seventy-two."

Slytherin house exploded in cheers, stamping and banging of goblets against the table. Harry was ecstatic to be part of it and was caught up in the moment. Even the ever dour Professor Snape was vigorously clapping. Dumbledore waited for their celebration to calm before continuing.

"Yes, yes, well done, Slytherin. However recent events must be taken into account," Dumbledore proclaimed. Harry thought, he wasn't going to give Longbottom and his friends points for going down the forbidden third floor corridor, was he? That would be ridiculous. The room went very still, and along with Harry the, Slytherins were waiting, waiting to see if the Headmaster would take their glory from them.

"Ahem, I have a few last-minute points to dish out. Let me see. Yes … First - to Mr Ronald Weasley … for the best-played game of chess Hogwarts has seen in many years, I award Gryffindor house fifty points."

Gryffindor's cheers were outrageously loud, even louder than Slytherin celebrating their win. Harry couldn't believe it, the Headmaster was giving them points for breaking the rules. Well, he thought to himself, now was as good a time as any to be a true Slytherin and bend the truth to his benefit. So as the noise started dying down, he glanced at his friends with a reassuring look, he wanted them to be sure he was quite sane, and started laughing like mad. Maniacally. And as the hall fell into silence, it was impossible to ignore.

Dumbledore's voice carried over, "is there a problem Mr. Potter?"

"You see Headmaster, you're rewarding students for breaking the rules and entering the forbidden third floor corridor. If I had known I would be rewarded for getting past your tasks, I would have spoken up much earlier! In November, in fact. By myself. If beating the chess set is worth fifty points, how many do I get?" Harry called out.

The Gryffindors looked shattered. They had hoped the Headmaster would reward his old house for showing their proper qualities, they'd hoped to unseat their rivals, the Slytherins, right in their moment of triumph. Longbottom and Weasley were glowering at Harry, but he couldn't find it within himself to much care, while Granger was looking at the Headmaster with a puzzled expression. In contrast, Dumbledore looked even happier and his smile widened. "Ah, thank you for solving that mystery for me, Mr. Potter. I truly appreciate it. Now, please be patient, I will get to you in a moment."

"Second - to Miss Hermione Granger … for the use of cool logic in the face of fire, I award Gryffindor house fifty points." The mentioned girl buried her face in her arms, not knowing how to deal with all the attention. The Gryffindors clapped for her, but still somewhat subdued.

"Third - to Mr Neville Longbottom … for pure nerve and outstanding courage, I award Gryffindor house sixty points." Which tied them with Slytherin, who knew what Dumbledore would've done if Harry hadn't spoken out. The hall was silent as they waited to see what would happen in regards to him.

"For a display of true cunning and ambition, and impressive magical prowess I'm positive would be a sight to behold, I award Mr Harry Potter … One hundred and ten points."

Once again Slytherin house celebrated their victory of the House Cup for the seventh year running. Except for this time Harry was buried under a pile of people hugging him in congratulations. From the look on Sophie's face, she clearly approved of his manipulation of the truth for the house's benefit. The celebration continued after the feast with a party in the common room late into the night. As Harry was clapped on the back, got his hand shook or a hug from nearly every person in Slytherin and received his first kiss from a third year girl he didn't even know the name of, he decided it was undoubtedly advantageous to be the hero.

The next morning at breakfast, exam results were handed out by a student's head of house. Snape handed Harry his with a nod and a brusque, "Very well done, Potter."

Knowing he meant winning the Cup last night, but also hoping he meant his results, Harry slowly opened the parchment. Scanning rapidly, noticing he got all Os, Harry searched for the class ranking. In McGonagall's near-perfect script at the bottom, there it was. 'Year Rank: 1.' Harry let out a relieved sigh, and looked around at his competitors, they all knew who each other were, giving them nods of recognition and they were returned in kind. Though, the determined set to Granger's face was certainly a mask to hide her disappointment. Harry wondered how close they were in overall points among their classes, it had probably been ridiculously close.

Later that morning as Harry rode in one of the horseless carriages, that smelled faintly of mould and straw, down to Hogsmeade Station past the magnificent wrought iron gates of Hogwarts, he hoped the summer would be just as promising as it seemed.

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


	11. Never Been

A/N : In canon the transfiguration system rapidly introduces inanimate to inanimate, inanimate to animate, and animate to inanimate. Personally, I view this as poorly thought out and unrealistic. In this chapter I mention Harry hasn't worked on animate to inanimate yet, even though the canon end of first year exam for transfiguration is turning a mouse into a snuffbox. That is because I think it's pretty dangerous to change a living being into an inanimate object, and consequently much more difficult and advanced.

A/N 2: Not J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros. Don't own anything you recognize. Quite poor, honestly.

Pertinent Prophecy Presentiments

Chapter 11: Never Been

The return of students from Hogwarts occurred a day before the Summer Solstice this year. Therefore, Harry found himself flooing off to Remus' cottage after spending only a short amount of time with Andromeda and Ted. As an administrator of St. Mungo's Andromeda was invited to the Ministry Ball, which started only hours after Harry's arrival in London with a dinner. Dora was part of the Ball's security detail as part of her Auror training so she wasn't even available to be at the station. Sirius and Sarah had also been preoccupied with some political meeting going on beforehand. Harry didn't mind much, though. He would see plenty of his family tomorrow since celebrations for the Solstice began with sunrise and went all day long.

The cottage was located in Yorkshire, in an area rural enough it was safe for Harry to fly there. He was always happily welcomed into Remus' home whenever it wasn't near a full moon. One had just passed and while Remus was still recovering, the other option was sitting alone in the Tonkses' house. Over dinner, the two of them discussed the past year as well as future summer plans.

"The dragonpox outbreak going around recently has a significant number of people concerned," Remus commented.

"What happened? Sirius has kept me up-to-date with how badly the Blacks have been hit, and I know a few classmates whose relatives have passed. How bad is it?" Harry asked.

"Fortunately it appears to be finishing up. If summer started and it was still in full capacity who knows how many children may be infected. I was glad to hear not a single student was infected over Spring Break. A surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one. Sadly, the older generations were rather unlucky. I'm sure Sirius has explained the political ramifications that will come about and you'll hear much more of it in the coming months," Remus told him.

"Yeah, Death Eaters in power," Harry spat disgustedly.

"Yes," Remus sighed. "Hopefully the changes made in the past three years will be sufficient to manage it at least somewhat." Remus then asked, "regardless, what are your plans for the coming summer? Going to stay busy?"

"Definitely!" Harry replied. "I need to do a lot of flying. There's an opening spot for Chaser next year and if I'm going to be good enough, I need to make sure I'm in top form. Not flying has made me lose some endurance and ability. Also, the Slytherins play pretty aggressively so if I want to fit in I need to be able to play like that.

"Then, of course, I want to keep up with my studies. If I sit around all summer, I'll definitely be behind at the start of the year. I can finally get mum's third year journal too! She's had so many neat spells and ideas, and she was only a second year! I really wish Sirius would let me have them all so I could just find out how much she discovered," Harry rambled.

"Yes, Lily was a singularly gifted witch. I'm sure she would be quite proud of you if you can perform all the magic she could by the end of her second year," Remus commented and Harry swelled with happiness. Knowing his parents would be proud of him was always wonderful to hear. "I do think it is advisable to not read through all of them so soon. There are some things simply easier to relate to when you're closer in age. For example, in third year the animosity between your mother and father spiked dramatically. I'm sure you'll understand better now than two years ago."

"But why?" Harry asked.

"As you know, third years are allowed to visit Hogsmeade. It is also when dating begins to crop up among the Hogwarts population. Your parents had a rocky start, to say the least," Remus explained. Harry understood, he'd been sat down by Sirius before being given the first journal and narrated the story of James and Lily's relationship, because if the first two years were any indication, his parents were a very unlikely couple. Still, he huffed in exasperation due to not being capable of learning more magic from his mother.

"As far as quidditch is concerned, you are, as always, welcome to come here to fly as long as I'm here and it isn't within a day of the full moon. If the Slytherins play much as they did during my time at Hogwarts you're going to have to fill out a bit, they were brutal during the games I watched against Gryffindor. James didn't until fifth year." Remus paused in thought, "you know, Sirius still keeps up with his workouts from when he was a Hit-Wizard, those would likely be beneficial. Have him show you," he advised. "Unfortunately, with my condition, regular exercise is unwise."

Harry nodded along with what he was being told, anything to help him get that spot if skill wasn't enough. "Harry," Remus began, getting his attention. "I have complete faith you can fly well enough, but being blindsided by a seventh year is most likely a ticket straight to the hospital wing if you aren't prepared."

"I know, I know."

"Very well. Now, because we're continuing last summer's lessons I need to know just how advanced you are," Remus queried. "Your mother was performing fourth year charms by the end of her second year, you said you could cast those. What else can you do?"

"I can do the Summoning, Banishing, and Freezing Charms. With transfiguration, I'm pretty advanced with inanimate-to-animate, that's third year. I haven't tried animate-to-inanimate because there's a lot that could go wrong if I mess up. For defence, I can cast acceptable stunning and shield charms, and I've gotten good at using transfiguration in a duel. Just like dad did," Harry explained enthusiastically. He was proud of how much he had learned in the past year.

"That is wonderful. You certainly are your mother's son. What of Sirius' niece, Sophie?"

"She's a little behind me. She doesn't spend as much time working on magic. If I had to guess, I would say her wandwork is beginning third year," Harry mused.

"Excellent. We'll keep the same schedule as last year. I look forward to tutoring you two. If you'd like we could start on some semi-permanent charms and cursebreaking this summer," Remus said.

"I'd like that," Harry replied. Maybe if he became good enough at cursebreaking it wouldn't be as dangerous to explore the room Quirrell told him about. Semi-permanent charms were new to him, but learning any new magic was exciting.

Remus explained that semi-permanent charms were essentially cheap versions of enchantments requiring a receptacle, that would support the charm for an extended period of time. The major difficulty was creating the receptacle because while it could sustain powerful magic it was incredibly delicate during its creation. With his head full of ideas regarding potential uses for semi-permanent charms Harry flooed home just before nine, when the Ball would end, because it was necessary to awake before sunrise for the Solstice.

The next day was filled with celebrations of the sun, a bonfire, nature walks, a ritual of longevity and prosperity, and all around joyfulness. Harry was happy to be around his family again. Andromeda was quite busy but content with her promotion at St. Mungo's, while Ted was continuing at the local news station doing his best to support Dora during her ten hour days of Auror training. Dora herself was as chipper as ever, pranking people, cracking jokes and talking off whoever's ear she currently had.

Her look today, as she told Harry, was punk rocker. Something she'd been introduced to by one of her fellow Auror Trainees and embraced over the past year. Harry thought it suited her, from the spiky pink hair to black leather combat boots. She also warned Harry to keep a wand within easy reach at all times. Her new Auror mentor was the infamous and tentatively insane Alastor Moody, who could pop up at any time to 'test' him.

"He's a hard bastard with a lot of experience, and it won't be easy, but I'll be trying my best to learn as much as possible from him. Who knows when I'll need it down the road," Dora said prophetically. This caused Harry to internally squirm, thinking about Quirrell. At least it sounded like she would be prepared.

Sirius and Sarah were obviously closer and happier than ever before, spending more time off by themselves than with the rest of the family. Harry was able to have a conversation with Sirius about politics, though.

"How's the exchange program coming?" Harry asked.

"Pretty good," Sirius replied. "Many of the details need to be figured out, but Albus and the Board of Governors have finally given their support in the last week. It'll probably take months to get everything decided. The goal is to announce it at the end of next school year, meaning the students will have a year to prepare to go off to another country. Language potions, selection of students and all that. Are you thinking of going somewhere?"

"Erm, maybe? It sounds like a lot of hassle, but it might be nice to explore new places," Harry told him, not knowing how Sirius would react to him wanting to go to Durmstrang. "I know Sophie wants to go to Beauxbatons for their magical art program."

Sirius let out a short laugh, "yeah I can see that. By the way, I need to thank you two for that letter about contacting Augusta Longbottom. Between the exchange being a sure thing now, and that third floor fiasco the committee will get wholehearted support."

He went on to elaborate, "last night at the Ball we found out it'll be supported by the three major alliances in the Wizengamot. Malfoy will support anything if he thinks it will check Dumbledore. The Longbottom alliance will support it because her precious grandson was endangered. Finally, those in the middle stand together and since I'll be the one proposing it, they will support it. Of course, everyone wants to make sure Hogwarts is as good as possible before the exchange students arrive, as well. It wouldn't do to make anything less than a perfect impression!"

"That's great," Harry commented.

At the end of the long day, everyone was finishing up with the final meal just before sunset. Harry was exhausted and incredibly full, he could feel the inevitable food coma setting in. Sirius, it appeared, had one last thing to accomplish before nightfall. He clinked a utensil against his goblet, gaining everyone's attention and stood with Sarah, all the while a giddy smile plastered on his face.

"We have an announcement of some exciting news for everyone," Sirius began, then motioned for Sarah to continue.

"I found out over a month ago, but Sirius wanted the whole family together, and well, we're pregnant!" she announced.

Andromeda jumped up and swept, she was too dignified to run, over to Sarah to engulf her in a hug while they both talked a mile a minute.

Remus, who had shown up for dinner, went over to Sirius and clapped him on the back.

Ted leant over to Dora with a mischievous expression. "Don't get any ideas, okay?" he asked. She gaped at him before a horrified look appeared on her face and she shivered in distaste.

Harry didn't really know what to do, but quickly decided to head over to Remus and Sirius, who was still having a hard time containing his glee. "Congratulations, Sirius."

"Thanks, kiddo."

He wondered what you talk about in this situation. Fortunately, Dora came up with something. "Hey, is it a boy or a girl?" she shouted across the room.

"It's a boy!" Sirius exclaimed, over Andromeda's admonishment of her daughter for yelling across the room.

Dora pouted. "Aw, I wanted to have someone to treat like a little sister. Guess I'll just keep working my claws into Sophie," she said, shooting a crooked smile in Sarah's direction, who only waved her hand elegantly in indifference.

Turning back to Sirius, Harry decided to say what was on his mind. "For what it's worth Sirius, I think my parents would be happy for you and proud of what you've done," he said.

Sirius put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed lightly. "Eh, they'd probably be questioning Sarah's sanity more than anything. But, yes, I can only hope that they would," he said with a sad smile.

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Three weeks into break and Harry was settling into the routine of summer. Mornings after breakfast Harry would floo to Grimmauld Place to strength train with Sirius, doing push ups, pull ups, squats and varied ab workouts. Apparently, Hit-Wizard and Auror training also included a lot of running, but since Harry flew every afternoon it worked well enough. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday after dinner Remus would tutor Harry and Sophie. Both of them were making good progress with creating a receptacle but they had a penchant for bursting into flames if something went wrong.

The lessons were paired with Harry delving into his mother's journal, this one was the most interesting yet. During her third year she had really expanded on her exploration of magic, and Harry soaked up every bit of knowledge provided. The final beneficial part of summer were Occlumency lessons from Andromeda. Supposedly beneficial, Harry amended in his thoughts, because the lessons left him feeling exhausted and mentally strained. More so than he had been at the end of Hogwarts' exams.

"It has been decided to advance your learning in the mind arts," Andromeda began after Harry had returned home from his first tutoring session with Remus. "Before now I taught you how to clear your mind and you could detect an intrusion or influence. What a near total majority of magicals learn. It is also rather easy compared to the advanced techniques we will be implementing from here. The benefits of continuing your education are being able to prevent and expel any intrusion or influence on your mind, along with increased emotional control and magic sensitivity."

During her lessons, Andromeda would attempt to attack Harry's mind and access his memories. She was gentle, not pushing deeply and he was naturally skilled enough to keep her away from the memories he would like to be kept secret. Specifically those of Quirrell and their private lessons, Sirius letting Harry accompany him and Dora down the third-floor trapdoor or anything he'd rather not have her see really. Still, he was making noticeable progress, especially due to a book filled with tips and tricks from the Black Library Andromeda had told him about.

Not everything was going perfectly, though. Soon after returning home from Hogwarts Harry became acutely aware of two problems. The first and probably more annoying was his diminishing eyesight which was beginning to grow increasingly blurry. He definitely was not looking forward to taking the corrective potion again, because it meant spending three days wanting to tear his eyes out. The other was something he wasn't quite sure about, fits of feeling weak, powerless and empty plagued him. It wasn't so much a physical feeling as mental. For example, he would find himself in a situation and the fact he could do nothing about it triggered these feelings, eventually culminating in anger at his weakness.

These fits had only occurred three times during the first week, and with the last one, Harry discovered their cause. He had been attempting a maneuver on his broom while flying above Black Manor, but couldn't quite stick it and nearly falling every time. In a fit of anger, he let loose a particularly dark slashing curse at a nearby tree, felling it easily and explosively. Feeling the dark magic flowing through him, giving him a vindicated and empowered feeling was all it took for Harry to realise what was happening. It had been a whole month since he had cast any of the Dark Arts at that point, and he missed experiencing their faculty.

The revelation startled and worried Harry briefly. However, he was logical enough to recognise that he was currently already working on the solution. Occlumency, and its ability to help control emotions. Andromeda, distaste quite palpably encompassing her, had told Harry while she was an able Occlumens, her sister Bellatrix was the best in the family due to her fascination with the Dark Arts. Despite feeling anger at being any way similar to the vile person who had killed his father, he had to admit she was a powerful witch. After that day, Harry had made sure to put his full effort into learning the art and hadn't had any problems for the last two weeks.

Hogwarts letters for second year had arrived earlier that morning, and Dora had enthusiastically offered to take Sophie and Harry to Diagon Alley in order to purchase their supplies. The plan was to go through all the magical shopping early, before the crowds swelled, followed by lunch and some further shopping in the muggle world nearby. They were at their final magical shop, Flourish and Blotts, when Dora ran into one of her old classmates. Ten minutes and multiple attempts to pull Dora away later, Sophie was thoroughly bored and Harry impatient.

"Come on, let's get out of here," Sophie said in an undertone, motioning towards the door with a jerk of her head.

"What about the books?" Harry whispered back.

"Dora can take care of them. She has everything else, does she not?" Sophie replied. This was true. Dora had a bag with an Undetectable Extension Charm, in which all their other supplies were currently being held.

As sneakily as possible the two of them slipped out of the store and onto Diagon Alley, where the lunch crowd was beginning to show up. Easily slipping between the passersby, Sophie led Harry around the next corner. Traffic immediately dropped off, and despite the darkened setting they found themselves in Harry quickly understood why. This was Knockturn Alley, rumoured home to all things Dark and unsavoury. Sophie took a steadying breath before descending the steps into the alley. Despite his confidence in his abilities, Harry wondered if this was a good idea.

"What are you thinking?" he hissed once he caught up to her.

"I'm curious. Are you not? I've always wanted to know what is down here. It'll be really quick, just down and back. Dora won't even notice we were gone," Sophie said nonchalantly.

As they passed Noggin and Bonce, a shop apparently specialising in shrunken heads, Harry made his thoughts known. "For the record, I have a bad feeling about this."

"So noted," Sophie replied curtly.

For most of the way down Harry simply glanced in the windows of shops, catching glimpses of a wide variety of wares. Everything from a barber to a bone emporium to a hat shop could be found. Sophie and he moved rather quickly with purpose, so as to not appear lost, and avoided the more distasteful persons found throughout the alley. Overall, Harry thought it not as bad as rumours made it out to be. Although it was somewhere Harry wouldn't want to venture if he didn't have to.

Two shops away from the end of the alley, where a pub called The White Wyvern stood, they were about to turn around. From out of nowhere, Harry was slammed into by something significantly heavy, a thick cloth bag was shoved over his head and cinched tight. He heard Sophie's muffled panicked scream and knew the same thing had happened to her. He nearly panicked himself, heart racing, breath coming in quick gasps and thinking as fast as he could.

Held in place by a pair of incredibly strong arms, he tried to squirm free of his assailant any way possible with no luck. He cursed repeatedly in his head, he had just relaxed his magical perception since they'd traversed the whole alley without any issue. He hadn't been prepared for any attack, physical or magical.

"Fiery little thing, ain'tcha?" came the gravelly voice of whoever was holding Sophie. She was apparently struggling as well.

"They'll make a great set of cubs, they will. Only gotta hold 'em for three days too," was Harry's captor's reply, his voice every bit as rough.

Cubs? Three days? Rough, animalistic voices? With a brief moment of clarity and a jolt, Harry realised these were werewolves. Attempting to turn them on the full moon, in three days. He'd been struggling to escape before, but now he raged. His magic boiled throughout his body, just begging to be released in wrath. He kicked, twisted and tried to wandlessly banish(he hadn't been able to do it yet, but now was as good a time as any to try) his captor with all he had. The only indication he was doing anything were the periodic grunts whenever he made contact. Was no one going to come to their aid? They were in the middle of the alley for magic's sake!

They were beginning to be dragged away when a glimmer of hope presented itself to Harry. In the form of his ebony wand falling out of his left sleeve - directly into his right hand. His wrists were being held behind him by one of the werewolf's hands, but he had some ability to move his own. Knowing he would only get one chance to do this right and have the best chance to save Sophie, he carefully angled his wand towards his captor.

Briefly doing the best possible to clear his mind, Harry prepared to jump into action. Throwing out his magical senses, he discovered Sophie was in front of him. Good, that was better for what he had planned. He hadn't felt the bag around his head be tied, so hopefully, he could tear it off easily. If not, he would just rapidly cast stunning charms in the direction of Sophie and her captor. He was ready.

" _Discerpomnia_!" He felt the most powerful and dark slashing curse he knew easily tear through his robe sleeve and make a terrible noise as it hit his captor. The sound of bones rupturing and flesh being shred apart, his mind supplied. Harry was already yanking his arms free and swinging his right arm up to cast at Sophie's captor while his left hand tore off his head covering.

The sight that met his eyes was the werewolf in front of him turning around in shock while Sophie instinctively was dropping to the ground. Harry didn't hesitate. " _Expulso_!" The blue spell hit the man on the left side of his chest, just below where his arm connected. The result was the man being flung straight over Sophie, with a barely connected arm and an obviously fatal crater in his chest cavity.

Harry turned around to make sure his captor wasn't a threat. The man was on the ground, certainly dead. All the way from right hip to left collarbone was brutally cleaved apart. Standing there, staring at the man who moments ago he had killed, Harry was near catatonic. The whole ordeal had barely been two minutes, but to Harry, it felt plenty longer.

He looked between the two men in a daze, taking in the damage he had done. He didn't even notice Sophie getting up and taking the bag off her head. Suddenly he lurched forward, catching himself on his hands and knees. Upon reaching the ground, he retched, emptying the contents of his stomach onto the already grimy cobblestones of the side alley they were in.

Sophie came up next to Harry, keeping out of his sick and rubbing circles on his back. "H-Harry? What was-"

She was cut off as a gruff, but much more human than the werewolves, voice rang out. "On your feet lassie! What if there were more of them? CONSTANT VIGILANCE! Bloody idiots, the both of you," the man criticised.

Harry, who had been figuratively locked in his mind until then, tensed and began to get up. Meanwhile, Sophie pointed her wand at the newcomer. "Who are you?" she asked.

He let out a guffaw, "Not someone to point a wand at. Some situation you got yourselves into, eh? It's what happens without CONSTANT VIGILANCE!" he roared. "Now move. Nymphadora's noticed you missing and the lad needs to get out of here."

Harry was extremely pale and barely standing on his feet. At the mention of Dora's name he looked over the newcomer, recognising him from her description. "Moody?" he breathed out.

"Aye, Potter," he said while turning and motioning for them to follow.

Harry walked after him in a daze. "As in Mad-Eye Moody?" Sophie asked quietly.

"Yeah," Harry replied as they came out on Knockturn Alley proper. Moody stopped them to clean off the blood and sick splattered on their clothes. The denizens all became immediately wary, seeing the famous Auror in their safe place.

The three of them made their way to Diagon Alley. The only words spoken were Moody telling Sophie to keep her wand out when she made to put it away. Returning to Flourish and Blotts, they were fussed over by Dora and she held Harry in an extended embrace while giving him a pitying look. Moody then went off to deal with the clean-up of the recent altercation. The rest of their plans obviously out of the question, Sophie, Dora and Harry flooed to the Tonkses house for soothing hot cocoa and to share comforting words.

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Harry spent the next week in the self-imposed isolation of his room. It had been the week of a full moon, so Remus hadn't been able to tutor. When Andromeda tried to get him to work on Occlumency, all she saw was the encounter in Knockturn Alley over and over, which did more harm than good. A number of people tried to talk Harry out of his funk, with little success. It wasn't until the next Saturday when Moody himself visited the Tonks household that Harry was able to start the process of moving forward. He knew what he had done was the right thing to do. Would have done it exactly the same again if he could go back in time and do it over. What he needed, and Moody freely supplied, was a solid old-fashioned kick up the arse rather than the pity and sympathy everyone else was giving.

Without much changed, Harry went back to his routine. Though he did have to convince Remus he didn't hold the actions of the two other werewolves against him. Additionally, Sophie was slightly distant for a while, although after Harry went back to being his normal self she relaxed. He never found out the true cause but assumed that while she knew he was a highly capable wizard, seeing it unleashed on another human so ruthlessly was startling. Another point which impacted Harry was how skilled Quirrell must be, to have allowed those level of spells flung at him regularly. It humbled Harry, and he knew just how much he had to improve to be on his old teacher's level.

By the time his birthday arrived, Harry fully moved forward from his internal personal battles. Receiving a Nimbus 2001 and attending a professional match between Puddlemere United, his father's favourite team, and the Appleby Arrows may have had an influence on that. It was a good thing too because August 1st was the Harvest Celebration.

Once again, as with the Winter Solstice and Beltane, Harry found himself as Sophie's escort to a Ball. He didn't understand why her family insisted she attend the Malfoy's, subsequently bringing Harry. Rather than let her attend the Greengrass' where her friends, aunt and uncle would be. He was grateful this time, though, because Slytherin's next quidditch captain, Marcus Flint, would be there. Daphne had gotten that bit of gossip who knew where, but Harry was appreciative for her passing it on. He wanted to give him notice of his intention to try-out for the team.

Soon after his arrival, Harry noticed the mood was decidedly dismayed, the same as on Beltane. Last time he had simply gone with the flow but chose to ask about it now to satiate his curiosity. "Why are people so upset? It wasn't like this for Winter Solstice," he asked Sophie when they were away from everyone else.

"They feel like their traditions have been taken away," she told him. Elaborating, she continued, "before the war with Grindelwald, I think, there would be huge festivals held in celebration of Beltane and the Harvest. There's a huge field in Dartmoor near a campground that's warded against muggles where witches and wizards from across the country would flock to. Apparently, it was too dangerous with the war."

"And why didn't they start afterwards? When the war was over?"

"According to my grandparents, some people claimed they were promoting drunken debauchery, dark magic rituals and had become a wretched hive of scum and villainy. Which they also say isn't true in the slightest," Sophie explained. She paused seeming to consider what she had said, "not sure how reliable they are on that. Anyway, it's been banned since then and people are still ticked off about it."

"Huh. That makes a good amount of sense," Harry concluded.

Eventually, Harry saw Flint leave his friends heading towards the direction of where the drinks were. Deciding it the best opportunity to approach him, he asked Sophie if she wanted anything before excusing himself to follow. Catching up to his quarry, Harry tried to draw himself to his full height and look as intimidating as possible. While Flint was obviously larger than him, minimising the difference as much as possible would only be to his benefit. "Flint, a word if you could?"

Flint stopped and turned towards him. "What, Potter?"

Harry motioned for them to continue walking, which they did. Continuing his charade he tried to deepen his voice, to some success. "I know it's abnormal for second years, but I want to try out for the quidditch team. I've been told you'll be captain."

"What position? Seeker or chaser?"

"Chaser. But I can play a decent seeker. When I get bored, I'll sit let a snitch loose to work on reflexes. Both while flying around and when I'm just sitting somewhere," Harry told him.

"Interesting," Flint said. He looked Harry over with a highly critical eye, examining if he could fill the position. While Harry had grown and put on a good amount of weight over the summer, he wasn't anywhere near the older students. "You're still pretty small to play with the big boys, especially as a chaser. Your father played quidditch?" he asked, remembering from some old roster in the Trophy Room and proving his dedication to the sport.

"Chaser for five years on Gryffindor, Captain for two and three Quidditch Cups," was Harry's succinct reply. He had rehearsed this in his head over and over after all.

"Alright, tryouts are the first weekend of term. I'll keep you in the loop for exactly when. No guarantees, and if anything you'll be an investment, Potter," Flint told him while grabbing the drinks he had gotten up for and leaving.

Harry took a deep breath and let it out slowly, dropping the act he had put on. That was as good as he could have hoped for, now he had to make sure his flying could back up his talk. Grabbing two glasses of non-alcoholic wine, better known as fancy grape juice, Harry headed off to find Sophie and enjoy the rest of the Ball.

Barring constant pranks and occasional surprise attack from Moody, the rest of August passed by easily without much excitement. A particularly memorable prank happened after Sirius and Remus pulled out all the stops and used their full capability of magic. Through a creative combination of enchantments, illusions and delayed transfiguration Sophie and Harry ended up in the middle of the Ministry's atrium looking like a pair of half house-elf, half human crossbreeds. Of course, they never left Grimmauld Place, but that was the genius of it. The two of them had elicited Dora's help for proper retaliation, crafting a stinksap trap potent enough that Sarah fled Grimmauld Place for two days while it was cleaned.

Through Remus' tutoring Sophie and Harry expanded their understanding of certain magical concepts there simply weren't time for during the school year, could reliably produce charm receptacles and, with Sirius' help, learned beginning cursebreaking techniques. Additionally, Harry continued learning by himself, incredibly pleased that he could perform magic at the Tonkses' house even when there were no adults there because it was a registered magical household.

He was pretty sure Andromeda knew he was practising illegally, since not much slipped by her, but let it be for whatever reason. There was also the fact that during occlumency lessons he spent so much concentration blocking the things he had to, and as she pushed him more and more some things slipped. But he was still improving with each session. By the end of the summer she had taken to trying to casually use legilimency on him randomly, and he was able to detect and block her.

When the First of September arrived, Harry was every bit excited as the previous year. He was ready to prove he had properly earned his top of the class rank, and do it again. Hopefully, the Chaser position would be his, he had put a crazy amount of effort into the task over summer. While his father hadn't started playing until third year, Harry wanted to surpass that.

Another aim he held for the upcoming year was finding a long-term duelling partner to replace Professor Quirrell. Someone who was better than him, wouldn't shy away from the Dark Arts and was willing to steer him in the right direction to improve his skills. The obvious answer from his mum's journals was Professor Snape. During third year he was one of the best duellers of his year and had no qualms about cursing people. Despite this, Harry had heard enough snippets of information to understand there was very much he didn't know about the man. There was every possibility he could have changed since then.

Evidently, Harry was looking forward to a particularly busy year in Hogwarts castle, and with the introduction of an oversight committee, the future only grew ever more so interesting.

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A/N: Feel free to PM/review with any questions, concerns, discrepancies or opinions. In fact, I would love to hear some criticism. Especially constructive criticism because, you know, that's the most helpful kind.


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